


Power and Compassion

by Drownedinlight



Series: Other Philosophies [2]
Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Always a Different Sex, F/M, Rule 63
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-04
Updated: 2017-07-18
Packaged: 2018-11-23 03:01:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 23,557
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11394006
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Drownedinlight/pseuds/Drownedinlight
Summary: Nine months after being struck by lightning, Beatrix awakes to find herself and her boyfriend, Tony, changed. Feeling a little unsupported by the parent figures in her life, and charged with a mission by a cosmic entity, Beatrix must decide how she will move forward.





	1. Dream and Waking

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AmandyPandy1612](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AmandyPandy1612/gifts), [Daughter_of_Scotland](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Daughter_of_Scotland/gifts).



> So I completed _Undeserved Favor_ before I started publishing it on 2016-05-21 which means that this was well over a year in coming. But it's here now! I actually started writing the sequel right after I finished the first one, but couldn't decide how I wanted to go on, landing me in development hell. Ultimately, I decided that this part of the story would be told primarily from Beatrix's perspective, which seems to have worked well in conquering the writer's block. Shoutout to AmandyPandy1612 who pulled this out out of the development hell! Also a shout out to Daughter_of_Scotland who is the Torry/SteelFlash ship mom. Cheers everyone! I hope you enjoy it!.

Beatrix dreams of paths branching out before her in weird paths curving back and forth like a Lichtenberg figure. That’s weird. Dreaming of Lichtenberg figures. Beatrix, in her dream, shrugs. It’s probably because she was struck by lightning.

Along each path, as she stands before them at the start, she can see different variations on what is to come. She can see that further down each path the variations become greater and greater. There are some paths that end in heartache. There are some paths that end in joy. There are paths that end somewhere in between.

Beatrix feels like she cannot move. Instead she waits. She watches. She heals.

Beatrix knows this must be a dream. The Lichtenberg figures fade out from view, and so have the images of people doing impossible things, but she remembers them. She remembers that the landscape fades from view into what looks like a copy of Central City. Beatrix wanders around with no need to eat or sleep. Why should she need to sleep, after all? She's sleeping.

So, Beatrix walks around the city. She walks and walks and at last finds herself at her old house. Beatrix thinks that's odd, given that she's never gone back to this house. Joe was the one to collect her clothes and any items she wanted. The family retainers were the one to pack up the house and sell anything off that could be sold. That included the house, though that hadn't been sold until just a few years ago.

But she still walks up the steps, and goes inside. Beatrix doesn't know what she's expecting. She certainly doesn't expect to see her mother sitting on their family couch. "Hello, Beatrix," says her mother.

"Hi Mom," says Beatrix. She moves to her mother to hug her,because even if she wasn't expecting it, it's nice to see her.

Nora hugs her back. "It's so good to see you--to talk to you. Even if we do have some important things to talk about."

"Dad's okay," she says in an instant. "I mean, he's still in prison, but he's okay. I'm working really hard to get him out. I'm going to find the man who killed you."

"I know, sweetheart, I know," says Nora. "And that's part of what I needed to talk to you about."

Beatrix furrows her brows. "Okay?"

"Sweetheart, where are you right now?" Nora asks.

"Uh, our house--in the dream at least. Out in the real world, I don't know. I know I'm dreaming," Beatrix says. Nora gives a soft smile, which makes Beatrix doubt herself. "Am I not dreaming?"

"Not really," says Nora. "You were struck by lightning. You're in a coma."

"Okay," says Beatrix with a nod, because that makes sense.

"But you are not dreaming, Barry," says Nora. "Right now, your mind is in an extraordinary place, which you can use to prepare yourself for the coming trials."

"There are going to be trials?" Beatrix asks.

Nora nods.

"Am I actually speaking to my mother right now?" asks Beatrix.

"Yes," says Nora, "and no. There is an energy in this universe, called the Speed Force. You were always meant to be apart of it, but something happened that accelerated the Speed Force's plans for you."

Beatrix has to smile at the verbiage.

Nora smiled back. "Oh, hush, you. We thought it might be easiest if I were the one that talked to you about this."

"We?" says Beatrix.

Nora nods. "We have much to discuss." She pats the cushion next to her. "Sit, Barry, sit."

Beatrix sits.

 

Beatrix wakes with a gasp, her mother’s face fading from her mind’s eye as her adrenaline forces her to take in her surroundings. She’s in a hospital room, say the defibrillator, the heart monitor, and the professional woman in a lab coat shining a light in her eyes. But the room as a whole says laboratory with a large monitoring consoles, large boards covered with calculations, and even building materials off to the side.

“Where am I?” she asks, trying to break free of the woman in the lab coat.

“You’re in STAR Labs,” says a young woman in a tee-shirt and brown corduroy pants. “I’m Chica,” she says, drawn her name out like shee-ca. “This is Caitlin, Dr. Snow.”

“I need some samples from you,” says Dr. Snow. “Will you let me take some blood? Or would you prefer to urinate first?”

“What?” Beatrix asks.

“Caitlin, maybe give her a minute,” says Chica. Chica reaches out, pressing a hand to Beatrix should so that she sits down on the medical bed. “Listen, Beatrix, this might be a little hard to believe, but you’ve been with us a while. If we seem a little familiar, it’s because we feel like we know you.”

“What happened?” Beatrix asks. She looked them both up and down and all around the room, searching for some answers. “How long have I been here?”

Chica and Caitlin look at each other and frown.

“There’s probably no delicate way to say this,” says Caitlin, placing the urine collection cup on a metal cart. “Beatrix, you were struck by lightning, just over nine months ago.”

The reference to nine months subconsciously draws her eyes to her stomach.

“Oh no!” says Chica, waving her arms. “That was the first thing Caitlin tested for. No babies.”

Beatrix still draws up her hands, scrubbing the heels of her palms over her eyes. She knows she was struck by lightning--she knows it, she felt it, she remembers it. “But nine months?” Beatrix asks, looking between Caitlin and Chica. “I feel like I fell asleep in my lab--better than that, even.”

Caitlin nods. “Your muscles should be degenerated,” she agrees, poking at Beatrix’s arm muscle, which had never been anything to sneeze at. As Caitlin pokes and prods, Beatrix realizes though that she does have some extra muscle on her arm--more than that, her torso, legs--every part of her feels toned and even a little buff. “Instead, the lightning strike seemed to have put you in a state of constant cellular regeneration.”

“Lightning gave me abs?” Beatrix asks.

Chica grins at her and even Caitlin cracks a small smile. “That’s one way of putting it,” says Dr. Snow.

“But if I was in a coma--if I got struck by lightning, why am I here?” Beatrix asks, looking between the two of them.

Before either of them can answer the sound of a motor drawing closer draws Beatrix’s attention to the doorway. There sits Dr. Harrison Wells, moving by way of wheelchair into the lab. He looks up as he enters and their eyes meet. Beatrix feels a shiver run down her spine, like someone had just walked over her grave.

“Ms. Allen,” he says. “Welcome back.”

“Thank you, Dr. Wells,” she says.

“Dr. Ramon, if you would notify Mr. Woodward and Ms. West, I’m sure they would be eager to know Ms. Allen is awake,” says Dr. Wells. “In the meantime, though, Ms. Allen, would you care to stretch your legs? If you’ll permit me, Dr. Snow, I think I can explain everything, Ms. Allen.”

Beatrix looks to Dr. Snow, who nods at her, and slides off of the edge of the hospital bed. She wears a pair of sweatpants, and a tank, and as she goes, Chica holds out a sweatshirt to her, emblazoned with the STAR Labs Logo.

“Saw you shiver,” says Chica with a smile.

“Thanks.” Beatrix pulls the sweat shirt over her head.

“I’m sure you have many questions,” says Dr. Wells, as they begin their way down the hall.

“Yes,” says Beatrix. “I was just asking Dr. Ramon and Dr. Snow why I was here.”

Dr. Wells nods, his bright blue eyes flicking up to look up at her before he focus back on the hall way. “You were admitted to the hospital, initially. I was there, myself...recovering, when I heard about you. The doctors thought you were going into cardiac arrest, and every time you did, the lights in the hospital would go out. I wondered if perhaps your heart was not stopping, but simply beating so fast that the average EKG couldn’t read it.”

“Were you right?” asks Beatrix.

“I was,” says Dr. Wells. “I asks for Mr. Woodward’s permission to move you here, and somewhat reluctantly, he agreed.”

“Joe was probably pissed,” Beatrix mutters, looking at the walls. She begins to notices cracks as they walk further in. She also wonders where the other employees of STAR Labs are--it’s one of the biggest research laboratories in the country.

“He wasn’t pleased,” says Dr. Wells. “But, Beatrix, I must confess, there was an alternate reason I offered to bring you to STAR Labs.”

Beatrix is grateful Dr. Wells pauses--or she thinks he pauses, because she can’t hear anything he says. She’s staring, instead, at what looks to be a massive crater in the middle of STAR Labs. “What...?” is all she can say.

“The night lightning struck you was the night the particle accelerator turned on,” says Dr. Wells.

“I remember.” Beatrix can’t take her eyes off of the massive, dark hole in front of her. “I was watching the news from my lab. Did the accelerator cause this?” She finally draws herself away and looks at him. “They says there was a problem, but...”

“When we turned the particle accelerator on, we all felt like heroes,” says Dr. Wells. He takes off his glasses and cleans them on the end of his shirt. “For about forty-five minutes, I had achieved my life’s work. And then, then there was an anomaly. The electron volts became unmeasurable, the ring under us popped, and then energy it ceded forced itself into the sky. Which created a storm cloud. Which created a lightning bolt.”

“That struck me,” says Beatrix.

“Yes,” says Dr. Wells, their eyes meeting. “That’s right. The energy released that night may have even affected others, though we have no for sure proof beyond the list of injuries and fatalities.”

“So...” Beatrix nibbles her lip. “Have you been studying me?”

Slowly, Dr. Wells nods.

“And what have you found?” Beatrix asks.

“In so far, that your cells regenerate astonishingly quickly,” says Dr. Wells. “You do not appear to degenerate even after a long period of time. Not much beyond that. I know Dr. Snow is studying your genetic code. Would you like us to discontinue our studies?”

Beatrix shakes her head. “I don’t know, to be honest. This is a lot to take in at once.”

Dr. Wells nods, again, slowly. “If you wish us to discontinue at any time, of course we shall.

“Thank you,” she says. Beatrix opens her mouth, but shuts it again as the thundering sound of thumping feet charges toward them. She looks up and sees Tony. Then it doesn’t matter--the giant hole, the presence of the magnanimous Harrison Wells, the thought of the lightning strike. Beatrix feels her heart swell at the sight of him. He holds out his arms to her.   Barry rushes into Tony's arms and he picks her up with every ounce of strength he has.

"Oh my God, honey," he says. "Oh my God, you're here, you're awake. Please, please, don't do that to me again."

"I will avoid all the lightning bolts in the future," she says, tears streaming down her face. "Oh, Tony, I love you so much."

"I love you too, my darling," he says.

They stand there in the hallway, just holding each other for a few minutes. Beatrix lets herself remember the lines of Tony's body--his torso, his shoulders, his face. She feels like it's all going to slip away, just like her mother did in the dream--or maybe it wasn't a dream. She still isn't sure. But Tony feels like flesh in a way Beatrix couldn't feel when she was in the coma. She's sure. She's absolutely sure.

At last they pull back from each other, tears still streaking down both of their faces. Then Tony wraps his arms underneath her knees and pulls her into his arms, making Beatrix squeal.

"Tony!" she says.

"You just got out of a coma, Trix," he says, as he begins walking back to the room where she had spent the last nine months. "Pretty sure you shouldn't be walking around. Like, literally--you shouldn't have the strength to walk."

Beatrix finds herself shrugging. "Well, you're the Catholic, babe. Pretty sure you're supposed to know a miracle when you see one."

He stops in his tracks and stares at her for a minute, then bursts out laughing. "God," says Tony. "I really did miss you." And then he leans down and kisses her.

Beatrix outright melts into him. Even if the passing of nine months had only registered as a really weird dreamscape, Beatrix had missed Tony. She pulls away and as she breathes, she whispers, "I love you." Even as she does the thought of the weird dreamscape tugs at her thoughts.

"I love you, too," Tony says.

Down the hall, Beatrix can hear someone shouting and it sounds like Iris.

"She made good time," says Tony, as he starts walking back. "I texted her as soon as Chica texted me."

Iris came with her father and Detective Thawne. Beatrix wonders why he's here instead of Chyre, but she can guess, and doesn't want to bring down Joe by asking. So instead, Beatrix just accepts their hugs, and their supports, and their questions about why one earth she is out of her bed when she just woke up. It's easier to let them fuss and worry, and when everyone has had their fill of it, Beatrix asks the million dollar question. "Can I go home?"

Everyone opens their mouths at once, and so she says, "Just for tonight. I promise I'll be back tomorrow to run any kind of diagnostics and pee in as many cups as you need me to."

Dr. Wells defers to Dr. Snow, who bites her lip as she considers Beatrix. "You promise not to over do it?"

Beatrix nods emphatically.

"Liquid diet," says Dr. Snow. "You just got out of a coma and so you're not use to solid foods. And no...strenuous activities."

Beatrix blinks, about to say that she just promised not to overdo it, when she realizes what Dr. Snow is saying. "Oh, yeah, sure."

"Alright then, but back here tomorrow, no later than ten, and I need you fasting for your first set of exams," says Caitlin. "I'm sure Tony will give you a ride over with Chica tomorrow."

"Ah, speaking of, and I don't mean to interrupt the reunion," says Chica as she turns to Dr. Wells. "But since my ride's already here, can I...go, for the day?"

Dr. Wells chuckles. "Yes, Francisca, that's just alright." He smiles brightly at all of them and says. "In fact, I think we will all be celebrating tonight."

Just then, Thawne's and Joe's phones go off. "Not us, it seems," says Thawne. "Bank robbery, downtown."

Tony has a new truck, Beatrix observes as they make their way to the parking lot. Iris helps Beatrix up into the back seat--or tries too, given that Beatrix feels fine and her muscles move naturally--before climbing in behind her. Chica takes the front seat next to Tony.

"What happened to the old truck?" she asks as Tony starts it up.

"Finally died on me," he says, looking around to make sure he was clear of Caitlin's car and following the SUV Joe and Eddie were in. "In April or so? It was a complete write off. This was a donation from some organization--I couldn't have afforded it otherwise."

The ride is surprisingly quiet. Chica hums from the front seat, Iris grips her hand tightly as they sit together, and Tony focuses on the roads. Beatrix glances up in surprise when they pull up onto the street of her mother's townhouse--well, her townhouse. "You opened your Christmas present, I take it?" she asks, as he put the truck in park. “I was gonna tell you when I got back from Starling. But I’m glad you found out.”

"Well, Iris told me," says Tony with a little shrug as he slid out of the car. He opens her door for her and places his hands on her hips as she slides out. Tony lets her drop gently to the ground before he places a kiss on her lips. "I, uh, hope you don't mind, but it was kind of big and lonely and stuff. Chica and Eddie live here with me. With us," he corrects.

Beatrix shake her head. "I don't mind at all. I think it's great actually." She has been turning over the thought in her mind of just how lonely Tony must have been. It has worried her since she woke up, and maybe even before she woke up, given that his friendship with Iris had still been in its infancy and as far as she knew he and Joe still did not speak to each other at length. Tony's family mostly lives in Keystone, which wasn't too far away, but probably would have been taxing on them both to try and go back and forth. To hear that he had house mates, friends even, to interact with on a daily basis gave her some hope that Tony hadn't fallen into a fugue of any kind while she had been...been in her coma.

"Um, also," says Tony. "Are you allergic to cats at all?"

"No," says Beatrix, blinking. "Why?"

"We have two," he says, ducking his head, making Beatrix laugh a little at his shyness. "One's Chica's and one of them wandered into the apartment when I was cleaning it out and refused to leave me alone."

"That's amazing," says Beatrix. She kisses him briefly before pulling out of his grip and taking him by the hand. "Come on, you can show me around."

Tony laughs. "You're always so generous, babe." He squeezes her hand and then tugs on her to pull her to a stop.

"What's a matter?" she asks.

"Your heart is beating really fast," he says, pressing his fingers into the pulse point of her neck. "Do you feel okay?"

"I feel fine," says Beatrix. "Really, Tony, I promise I'm not fibbing just to go home. I'm okay, I'm here now. If I start feeling poorly we can call Dr. Snow."

"And you'll tell me?" he asks. His brown eyes are wet, nearly spilling over with tears. Tony looks solemn in a way she had never seen: his mouth draws tightly across his face, new lines etch into his forehead and around his eyes.

"I promise," says Beatrix. She wraps her arms around his neck. "If it'll make you feel better, you can carry me across the threshold."

Her unsubtle flirtations get Tony to snort and roll his eyes. "That's when we get married, nerd," he says even as he sweep one arm around her back and the other under her knees. He kisses her forehead as he walks and says, "I love you."

"I love you, too, Tony," she says.

Chica is waiting in the living room just off of the door, holding an orange and gold colored cat in her arms. "Did you fall?" she asks, her eyes going wide.

"No," says Beatrix slipping out of Tony's arms. "Just, being reassuring. Can I pet her?"

"Sure," says Chica as she comes a little closer. "Her name's Papaya. I couldn't find Onyx though, Tony.

"I'll go find her," says Tony as Beatrix allows Papaya to sniff her hand.

"Aren't you a sweet baby?" says Beatrix as Papaya purrs while Beatrix scratches her ears.

"She is right up until she and Onyx literally get into a pissing war," says Chica. "Aren't you? Then you're just a lil asshole." Papaya purrs louder as Chica calls her an asshole, but then begins to meow and fidget to be let down "Alright, down you go." As she lets her cat down to the floor, Chica turns back to Beatrix. "So, you probably know your way around and stuff...um, you hungry?"

"Starving, actually," says Beatrix. "I know Dr. Snow says liquid food only, but do you think I can sneak some wontons or egg rolls?"

Iris rolls her eyes. "Well, if you're lucky, Eddie always brings home Madame Wu's after he works late."

Chica grins. "And oh, man, how I wish I could oblige that request. but if Caitlin says you need a clear liquid diet, then a clear liquid diet you shall have. Probably best just to prevent you from puking. Luckily, Eddie really loves Jell-O, so what's your poison?"

"Lemon?" Beatrix asks.

Chica blinks. "That's lucky. Eddie has like a million lemons. He certainly won't miss one. To the kitchen."

When Tony comes back, Chica is mixing Jell-O while Beatrix sit on the kitchen counter. Iris leans against the countertop next to Beatrix filling her in on the news of the last nine months. "Couldn't find her," says Tony. "So expect to be pounced on in bed tonight."

A beat of silence passes between them where Chica stops stirring the gelatin, Iris begins to laugh, and Beatrix's face breaks out with a giant grin. Tony blushes and waves his hands at them. "By the cat. Goddamnit, you know I meant by the cat."

"Uh huh," says Iris, a slick grin spreading across her face. "Sure. You meant the cat."

"Caitlin says no hanky panky," says Tony. "So I can wait. God, I can't even believe you're in this kitchen right now instead of still at the Lab. You should be at the lab."

"It's probably better that I'm here," says Beatrix, taking his hand. "If anything happens, you can alert Dr. Snow. If I were still at the lab I'd probably either have to spend the whole night there alone or she would have to stay with me. And Dr. Snow seems like a nice woman and a very capable doctor, if with an alarming number of tests that she has planned for me. But I'd really rather spend time with you now that I'm awake."

Tony's face is almost back to a normal color when he leans over to kiss her. Beatrix kisses back, short and sweet before she leans her forehead up against his, resting there for a moment, ignoring the clicks of Iris' phone as she takes pictures. "I love you so much," says Tony.

"I love you, too," says Beatrix.

"And I love you both, platonically speaking," says Chica as she pours the Jell-O into a bundt mold. "But listen, this is a little too cute for me."

Beatrix giggles and Tony grins. "Oh what?" he asks. "You don't want any of this?"

"Of your girlfriend, maybe," says Chica with a straight face and wiggling eyebrows. "But not of you. I've seen too much of your underwear."

Beatrix giggles again and hops off the counter. "Well, I dunno, you do make me Jell-O."

Chica nods, her straight face breaking out into a blinding grin. "You see, Tony? I know how to provide for a woman."

"I've made you spaghetti," says Tony, pouting at her. "C'mon now, Trix."

"Y'all're too much," says Iris. "And what are we actually eating for dinner, because I'm hungry too?"

"We do actually have leftover spaghetti that Tony made to tide us over 'till Eddie brings home Chinese," says Chica.

"Wait, Eddie's bringing home Chinese?" Tony asks. Then after a beat he says, before either of them could answer, "Oh, yeah, he's working late."

"You guys are all very mean to flaunt Tony's spaghetti and future Chinese in front of me," says Beatrix, crossing her arms in front of her chest in mock indignation.

Tony kisses her cheek. "Hey, you picked the Jell-O over my spaghetti, soo...lie in your bed, Trix."

"Your bed made of Jell-O," says Chica. Then she blinks, humming. "A bed made of Jell-O...I wonder if I can build it."

"Why would you want to?" Iris asks.

"Just cause," says Chica with a shrug. "Failing that, as long as it solidifies Eddie will eat it. He loves Jell-O."

"You'd need to make it out of strawberry,” says Beatrix, “Since a Jell-O bed would be a special occasion, and you make strawberry Jell-O for a special occasions."

Chica gives pause and stares at her. "Okay, seriously, are you and Eddie related? He says the exact same thing."

Beatrix laughs. “Not that I know of.”

When Beatrix realizes Chica’s stare, she also realizes Tony has been staring at her for a good few minutes, but like he's a little lost in thought. Beatrix nearly asks what's wrong, but she thinks she knows. He's trying to convince himself that this is all real, that she's here that she's staying that he not going to wake up and find her still in the coma. So she reaches out and takes her his hand, squeezing it in her own.

Iris rolls her eyes at this gesture. "You guys are cute but awkward."

"So awkward," says Chica from the stove, even though she doesn't turn around to look.

Beatrix rolls her eyes right back. "C'mon," she says to Tony. "You can give me the nickel tour. I haven't been to this place in years."

Now Chica does look back at them. Waggling her finger she says, "Remember what Caitlin says about the hanky panky."

"Bite me," Tony replies, flipping her the bird.

"Not in front of your girlfriend, bro." Chica waves them off.

Tony tugs her and they head further into the town house. On the main floor there isn't much to show off--just the living room that they've already been to and the in house laundry. The house is old enough that it was actually built with laundry shoots from all of the rooms, and each shoot is labeled with a simple wooden plaque. "Eddie did the plaques," says Tony. "He likes to wood work in his off hours. Chica wants to make it so we can shoot the laundry back up when it's done, but I told her that might be overkill."

"It would save on a lot of basket carrying, though," says Beatrix as she tapped her chin.

Tony rolls his eyes. "Oh my God, I am never leaving the two of you alone together. Come on, I'll show you the upstairs."

They take a servant's stair up to the second floor, which has the master bedroom and a second bedroom. "That's Eddie's room." Tony points to a door that's half way open. It's a little spartan, but Beatrix can see mementos hanging up on the walls and a neatly made bed. "This one is ours."

It reminds her a lot of how the apartment was. Tony has painted the walls a soft grey that lets the souvenirs and art work and canvases with dumb sayings on them add most of the color to the room. But there's some of Tony here now too--there's a piece of woodworking that Eddie surely gave him, a guitar, the license plates off of the truck. The bed spread is different too--a charcoal grey on a neatly made bed. There are also...pictures, scattered among everything. There's ones of Tony and his mother and Auntie Zara. There's ones of Beatrix and her family and Iris when they were little. There's the two of them together from their vacation in coast city. Pictures of Beatrix on a trail head with a group of people--a Squatch hunt she remembers. There's a picture right next to it of Tony on the same trail.

She giggles when she sees it. "You went looking for Sasquatch?"

Tony shrugs and lightly smiles. "I practically got forced into it. Your friend, Irene, she called to see if you were still coming because you weren't replying to her emails, and I explained everything. The next thing I knew they had raised donations for medical bills--most of which we didn't need because we moved you to STAR Labs after about two weeks--but Irene also invited me on the trip in your place. Well, Eddie and Chica practically forced me to go and relax for a little bit. They even got Naomi, Caitlin and Iris in on it, and man is there an unstoppable force."

"Irene's good people," says Beatrix. She sprawls out on the bed and pats the comforter next to her. "This was a nice place to come home to. You were nice to come home to."

Tony lays down next to her, propping his chin up on his hand. "It still feels unreal. I hope this sinks in soon, because I swear my heart's been racing since I saw you standing there with Dr. Wells."

And then, because Beatrix wants to, she leans over to kiss him, soundly on the mouth. They both hover inside of that kiss for some time, before Tony pulls away and says, "Kay, that was nice, but it cannot go on."

Beatrix laughs and says, "So, tell me about Chica and Eddie. What made you want to move in with them?"

  Tony hums as they thumb wrestle just over the duvet. "Well, Eddie started picking up Joe's shifts so Joe could spend time with you. And so we'd run into each other a lot. Iris asks him for coffee several times--they're dating, by the way, but let Iris tell you. Joe 'doesn't know,' by which I mean that Joe does know, but no one has told him anything, he just figured it out on his own. I recommend you don’t either saying anything to him either, though. I'm waiting for Iris and Eddie to stop keeping secrets."

"Kay." Beatrix rests her head against his shoulder as he talks.

"But anyways," says Tony with a little huff as he caught his breath. "I saw him a lot, ya know? And I found out he'd been in Central for nearly a month and he was still living out of what was basically a hotel. And, well, I'd just moved into here, and it's big. Even with Onyx it felt like I was trespassing. So I told Eddie he could move in. He didn't, not at first, but then the place he was staying had bed bugs or some shit, which pretty much forced him to leave. He was just gonna stay here temporarily, but that ended up being pretty permanent."

Tony waves his hands as he talks, nodding his head this way and that. Beatrix loves watching him talk. "Anyway, so we're living like it's a bachelor pad kinda thing. And we were both getting a little too comfortable with that--Iris suggested we get a third roommate, but doesn't want to move in because she thinks Joe doesn't know that she and Eddie are dating and doesn't want to give him any hints."

"Right," says Beatrix as she watches the hand waving become more erratic.

"Well, I'm getting to know Chica, because I see her every other day. Had her over for video games a couple of times, and she mentions that her lease is running out, and the landlord is gonna up the rent like $500 if she wants to renew, so I say, 'hey, I just need rent for property tax, utilities and internet, and me and Eddie are splitting it.' So she agreed to move in. Caitlin and Naomi are over here all the time, Iris too."

"So now you and Eddie are outnumbered." Beatrix grins up at him, resisting the urge to kiss him again. Really she wants to do more than kiss, but given how they aren't allowed to right now, she's going to stop herself all together.

Tony shrugs. "It's better for all of us that way. Plus Joe comes around and we have game days with the guys from the station and from the brewery."

"I suddenly feel very bad for Chica," says Beatrix, as she rolls onto her side.

"Meh, I wouldn't."

They both turned and saw Chica in the doorway, grinning at them. "I have an office upstairs, mostly I just head in there with a good pair of noise canceling headphones and send Tony texts about who's actually going to win based on math."

Tony flips her off. "Math, smath."

"First dinner is ready," says Chica as she flips him off right back.

"Do we always have first and second dinner?" Beatrix slides off the bed and follows Chica without further prompting. "Or just sometimes?"

"Mostly whenever Eddie's working late." Chica's eyes go back slightly into her head as she thinks. "It didn't become a thing for a while, but it's mostly because we're night owls, so I usually get like a snack later in the night anyway. It just became a thing on nights when Eddie works late, we eat dinner at like four and then he brings home chinese at the end of his shift."

Beatrix wants to say something about how nice of a tradition that is, but then her stomach growls. "Oh man," she says her face turning red.

Chica giggles. "No worries. I live with two guys. The amount of new noises I've heard from both of them is really amazing."

"I just really want some food," says Beatrix, wrinkling her nose.

"You can have food," says Tony behind her. "You're just gonna throw it up later. Clear liquids, baby."

"The Jell-O should be set by now," says Chica. "By the way, I have a question for you."

"What's that?" Beatrix asks.

"How do I get in on the Squatch hunts?" Chica nods at her, and Beatrix imagines it's because her face feels a little blank. "I just heard you guys talking about it, and I always wanted to ask, but it seemed insensitive when you were still in your coma."

Beatrix laughs a full belly laugh. "Basically, you have to know a guy. And you know me now. I'll have to email Frank--he's the one who takes the headcount before he sends it to Irene. But yeah, if you wanna go, we normally do it in August and it's what? September?"

"Yeah," says Chica.

"Perfect," says Beatrix, a smile warming her face. "So they should still have plenty of openings."

Tony plates some spaghetti squash noodle and sausage that he had made the day before, and Chica has reheated and put together with sauce. Beatrix tries not to feel jealous as she gets a literal bowl full of Jell-O. She would try to hate Jell-O, except it is lemon flavored and it might be impossible for her to hate lemon flavored things.

Beatrix resists the idea of giving Tony puppy dog eyes until he relents. He's probably right in that the solid food will make her throw it right back up. Comas, she decides then and there, sucked. They sucked hard.

"You should know," says Iris when she catches Beatrix glowering at the pot of spaghetti squash and sausage. "They've had trouble keeping on a CSI at the station. Captain finds fault with all of them."

"The Captain finds fault with me," says Beatrix, breaking her gaze with the pot to look up at Iris. "Namely that I'm late all the time."

"Yeah, but you haven't really been late late since you started dating Tony." Iris very pointedly brings the noodles to her lip and even slurps as she eats. The bitch. "Once or twice I've evenheard him say that he can't wait for you to get back."

     Beatrix retrains her glare onto Iris' fork instead of the pot itself. "I think you're making this up. I'd be a little surprised if I still had a job when I got back to the station, much less that people missed me."

Iris actually flicks a piece of tomato at her. "Find out for yourself then, sourpuss."

"Besides," says Chica, attempting and failing to twirl the spaghetti squash onto her fork. "I'm pretty sure it's illegal for them to fire you when you're in a coma. Disability and all that."

"Disability," says Iris around a full mouth as she points to Chica.

Beatrix sticks her tongue out at Iris and eats the tomato in rebellion. It turns out to be a bad idea, not because it prompts her to vomit, but because tomato and lemon don't go very well together on their own. "Thanks, Chica," she says as she downs some water to get rid of the weird flavor combination.

From there they talk and banter all night long. Not a half hour later, Caitlin joins them citing loneliness as the reason to come and hang out. Not long after Caitlin arrives, they have settled into play video games when Eddie walks through the door with a bag of Chinese food.

"You're all so cruel to me," Beatrix whines from where she's playing through a boss fight.

"You should get used to that now," says Eddie with a nod. He grins as he says it though, absolutely lit up. "Sorry, I would have been back sooner, but there was a mess at the station where a perp tried to get his arresting officer's gun."

They pause the video game and turn to Eddie expectantly.

"No one was shot, but once he figured out you can't pull a cops gun from its holster, he went a little ballistic," Eddie continues as he settles in an available space next to Iris. He kisses her cheek before opening the bag of Chinese food and offering her wontons. "I'm talking two flipped desks, a cracked skull and worse. And he did all of that when he was in handcuffs."

"Note to self: do not work for the police," Chica says as she looks back up at the screen. "We have too many people. We're gonna have to chance playing Mario Party."

"Chica, it's really not the perps that get you, it's the paperwork," says Eddie. He appears to ignore the Mario Party comment as he passes the bag of Chinese food to Tony. "My desk was one of the ones that got flipped. Paper everywhere."

"Bro I'm an academic," says Chica rolling her eyes. "Firstly, we're paperless, and secondly, if we weren't I still wouldn't fear paper as much as you are."

"Yeah, but you get to make up your words," says Eddie. "I have to write boring true crime that actually happens. To me, no less."

A bang interrupts their bickering and everyone's eyes slide to the door, which Eddie had left open. Eddie frowns but gets to his feet, as does Tony. Beatrix, for some reason she can't quite explain beyond feeling restless, does the same. Surprisingly, no one stops her as she leads the way out the front door onto the street.

Barry gets out onto the street with Eddie and Tony and sees it all at once, where the bang had come from. There was a man on the street and in front of him was a woman presses into the side of a car. In his hand, the man had a gun, which he waves around with a carefree ease. The woman, underneath the lamp light, looks terrified of the person in front of her. Barry ran before she thought about what she was doing.

She hears Tony start to call out her name, but then it was like everything slows down. Tony's cry turns into a low pitch moan, and Barry was across the hundred yards that separates her and the gun wielding man in seconds. He hadn't even had the chance to move as she took the gun from him. Time caught back up with her and he turns to look at where his gun had gone and saw Beatrix standing there with it in his hands. She squeezes in between him and the woman as Tony and Eddie came racing toward them.

"CCPD!!" Eddie says, drawing out his service weapon. "On the ground!"

The man considers going after the gun, Beatrix can see it in his eyes. Instead, he gets to his knees and put his hands behind his head.

"What the hell were you thinking?" Tony asks, as Eddie cuffs the guy. "You just got out of a coma, Beatrix."

"I couldn't just let him hurt her," says Beatrix to Tony, before she turns to look at the woman behind her. "Are you okay? Did he hurt you?"

"How did you move like that?" the woman asks instead her eyes wide at Beatrix.

"I don't know," says Beatrix easily, the question rolling off her shoulders with a shrug. "But really, are you okay? Do you need a medic?"

The woman shook her head. "I'm okay," she says. "Are you? Did you really just get out of a coma?"

Beatrix smiles at her. "I'm fine. Listen, do you have anyone who can pick you up, that you can stay with tonight?"

"My sister," says the woman. She sets to digging through her purse, pulling out a cell phone, just as the lights of a squad car lit up the street.

"Chica must have called the police," says Tony, drawing Beatrix's attention to him. He was looking at her again, like he had earlier, like she wasn't really there. "She's right you know. You moved so fast."

"I know," says Beatrix, softly, turning her attention to the squad car as it pulls up.

Tony turns his eyes to it as well, but Beatrix couldn't stop thinking about how he'd looked at her. Almost like he was afraid.

The officers, who knew Eddie, Beatrix, and the perp, got the guy in the car and then told everyone to give their statements tomorrow. They made the same recommendation that the woman stay with her sister, and by the time they were finish, her sister was there to pick her up. Beatrix thinks her feet might be frozen as they walk back into the house, and wonders why she hadn't bothered to put shoes on.

Iris offers Eddie a plate of reheated Chinese food, for it had gone lukewarm during the whole ordeal. The six of them sat around the living room as Eddie picks at his food in the quiet until Chica says, "Are we really going to pretend that what just happened didn't happen?"

So Chica has not only called the police, thought Beatrix, but she has seen what happened as well.

"Are you sure you saw her move like that?" Caitlin asks, softly, looking from Chica to Beatrix as she nibbled her lip.

Eddie let his plate rest on his lap. "Tony and I saw her too. One second Beatrix was with us and the next she was down the street. It wasn't 'like a second.' It was a literal second--she went down the street and then had the guy's gun in her hand."

"But how is that even possible?" Iris asks. Eddie moves the plate off of his lap onto an end table and let Iris collapse against him. "People don't just get struck by lightning, fall into a coma, and then wake up with superpowers."

Cisco and Caitlin share a guilty look, and before Tony, Eddie or Iris could jump on them, Beatrix says, "It's late. Why don't we talk more in the morning? Iris, you could come to the labs with us, I'm sure Caitlin and Chica can help figure out what's going on."

There's another moment of silence before Iris sighs. "Okay. I suppose you're right. Baby, can I stay here with you tonight?" This she directs at Eddie, who nods.

"Caitlin, the guest room is yours if you want it," says Tony before he turns to Beatrix. "You, ah, want a shower or bath anything before bed?"

Now that he mentions it, Beatrix feels her skin start to crawl a little with the thought of only having sponge baths for the last nine months. "That sounds like a great idea."

And just like that, the group breaks apart to their own separate quarters. Eddie stops only to pack away the Chinese food for tomorrow's lunch.

Beatrix feels her mind racing, and she doesn't know how to stop herself. Tony keeps her going though. He literally takes her by the hand and leads her to their bedroom where he helps her strip out of the sweats and underwear she wore. They make it to the bathroom--Beatrix sees the tub and remembers her mother bringing her here sometimes when they were showing it to renters. Beatrix would climb into the tub and pretend it was a ship sailing out to sea. She was always a pirate, searching for treasure or ships to plunder. Mom would smile down at her and lift her out of the tub. "Having fun, my brave little adventurer?" Mom would ask. Beatrix would nod and then they would go and get ice cream.

Tony draws her a bath as she walks through her memories. While they wait for it to fill, she sits on the tubs edge and uses a comb to work out the kinks and tangles in her hair. It's gotten a lot longer--then again, it's been nine months.

"What are you thinking about?" Tony asks.

"My mom, actually," says Beatrix, with a soft smile. "She used to bring me here all the time. It's hard not to think of her here."

"I know what you mean," says Tony, reaching out to run his fingers through her hair. "My aunties saved a lot of stuff that Ma willed to them. That bed for instance? It was my grandparents, and Nonina gave it to Ma when Nonino died. Sometimes I think about what she thought when she put that bed together in her home for the first time. If it still meant anything in the end." Tony smiles and leans forward to kiss her. "Ma would have loved you."

"My mom would have loved you, too," says Beatrix, pressing another little kiss to his mouth. She blinks at the thought, her brain trying to remind her of something, but not quite making the connection.

"Tired?" Tony asks as he watches her face go blank. He reaches for the taps and turns off the water, holding out his hands for her to brace against.

Beatrix steps into the bath and settles down, letting the water run all over her. "Must be. I was trying to remember something, but I could quite make the jump."

"'Bout your mom?" Tony asks, as he tilts her head back so he can run water over it.

"Yeah," she says, scrunching up her nose with thought. Then she shrugs and relaxes as Tony begins to massage shampoo into her scalp. "It'll come to me when it comes."

Tony takes his time washing her hair and then her body. It's not sexy, Beatrix thinks, they're just in no rush to finish or part from each other's company. Tony takes great care with how he brushes his calloused fingers over her skin. When she rinse off at last, Beatrix feels so relaxed her eyes threaten to shut her out before she's out of the water. Tony, too, seems more at ease with everything as he helps her dry off and slip into some pajamas. They crawl into bed with one another, wrapped up in one another's arms. Relaxed. Content. Together.

It lasts for about three hours.

Beatrix's eyes shoot open at 1:36 am according to the clock on Tony's nightstand. In her face there is a black cat. "Mrrw?" says the cat.

Beatrix wills her heart to slow down a little as she runs her fingers through the cat's fur. "You must be Onyx," she says as the cat leans into her touch. Beatrix pets her for a few minutes before Onyx decides she's had enough and walks over Beatrix to go and lay on Tony. Beatrix watches them for a few minutes before she slips out of bed.

She goes over to the window and slides it open and the screen to one side, before climbing out onto the fire escape. It wasn’t quite the patio that she had had at her old place, but it would have to do for now since Beatrix needs the fresh air. She curled her feet into herself and looks up at the stars—the moon has long since gone down.

“I don’t know if I can be what you want me to be,” she says. “Or do what you want me to do. I don’t know that I’m strong enough.”

Beatrix sits for a little while longer waiting, hoping, for a sign, but all she sees are the stars. She sighs, long and low, and lets her head fall forward onto her knees.

“Trix?”

Beatrix looks up and turns to see Tony sticking his head out of the window. “I’m sorry, sweetheart, did I wake you?”

“No.” Tony shakes his head gently and then climbs out of the window himself. “I woke up on my own. I was a little worried because you weren’t there though. What’cha doin?”

“I remembered what I forgot,” she says. Onyx climbs through after Tony and launches herself onto Beatrix’s shoulder, flexing her claws until they dig into Beatrix’s skin. Beatrix just reaches up with her free arm to scratch Onyx behind the ears. “How ‘bout you?” she asks as he sits down next to her.

“Just a dream,” says Tony, wrapping an arm around her waist, so he can lean into her. “I’ve had it ever since the particle accelerator exploded.”

"About what?" Beatrix asks, letting her head rest on Tony's shoulder.

"About when we went to the iron works that night," says Tony. He pauses as he wraps his arm around her. "I don't know that I should be telling you this. It's sort of a dark dream."

Beatrix nuzzles his neck. "I'll be okay. Tell me."

Tony hums for a moment before he goes on. "The foreman and his goons grabbed me that night. They pulled me up onto one of the catwalks and they were gonna beat me as l long as I let them. But, I moved all wrong and ended up going over the rails--or I think I did. I can't remember for sure. All I remember is this bright flash and then I hit something. I think I passed out and Naomi found me later. But in the dream..." He clears his throat and goes silent for a moment. "In the dream I do fall over the railing--I fall into a vat of iron, right as the particle accelerator goes off. I do pass out, for a little bit. But I wake up, I have to. I'm covered in molten iron, but I'm not burning. And I crawl out of the vat and onto the floor. It feels like the iron runs off of me, but at the same time--it runs into me."

Tony unwraps himself from her and turns to face her full on. "Trix I don't think it was a dream. Especially not after what I saw you do tonight. I think I fell into that vat. I think I crawled out. And I think..." He paused and held up his hand. Beatrix's eyes went wide as his skin glosses over, covered with a metal sheen. "It started in little bits and it would go away as fast as it came. I thought I was imagining things, but."

Beatrix took his hand in hers and kisses the metal. "You're not imagining things. I believe in you, Tony."

Tony looks at her, his eyes welling up. "What's gonna happen to us, Trix? Is the government gonna come for us in the late of night and take us apart?"

"I don't know," says Beatrix, casting her eyes down. "What I do need to say is that I've had a dream too. And I need to tell you about it." Beatrix cannot wait for his permission, because she knows if she falters, she won't be able to say any more. And so it all comes out--the speed force, her mother, what it has asked her to do. Tony doesn't blink, not once as he listens to her speak.

When she finishes, all he asks is, "Do believe that was what really happened? That your mother and some cosmic force spoke to you in a dream?"

"Yes," says Beatrix.

"Then I believe you," says Tony.

"Hey you guys." Chica appears above them, her head hanging down from her fire escape. "We made cocoa downstairs--looks like no one can sleep tonight. No! Papaya!" Chica's head disappears as she goes to catch her cat.

"Want some cocoa?" Tony asks.

Beatrix leans over and kisses him soundly. "Why not?" she says. "It counts as a liquid after all." She goes to stand, but Tony holds her fast and kisses her again.

"Are we going to be okay, Trix?" Tony asks.

"Yeah," says Beatrix, kissing him again. They hold hands as they get to their feet. They have to let go as they go through the window and head downstairs. There is more than cocoa it seems, as they've also reheated the chinese and are chowing down.

"Heeey!" says Eddie with a wide grin. He has a wonton in one hand and a cup of Jell-O in the other. He sounds a little drunk, but Beatrix guesses that it's more like sleep deprivation. "There's the happy couple."

"We got Chinese, we got Jell-O and we got cocoa, pick your poison," says Iris, pointing out the options.

Beatrix's stomach grumbles. "Hit me with a little of everything."

"Liquid diet!" Caitlin calls as she comes downstairs, dressed in a football jersey Beatrix knows is Tony's.

"I gotta argue on this liquid diet thing, because I am starved," says Beatrix as she plucks the wonton from Eddie's hand and pops it into her mouth.

Eddie looks at her like she has killed a beloved family pet. "Beatrix. How could you?"

"I'll make you lemon squares to make up for it," says Beatrix.

Eddie shrugs. "Oh, okay then. That makes up for it."

Iris socks him in the arm. "Uh, you've never forgiven me that quickly for anything!"

"Uh, you've never made me lemon bars," says Eddie as he rubs his arm.

There exists a sort of calm underneath their chatter. Beatrix feels a little foreign to it all, as if she is intruding. The people here have made friends and family of one another over the last nine months and Beatrix has had no part in that. But Tony leans against the counter with her, wrapping an arm around her waist. Caitlin smiles and shakes her head at her as she eats a spring roll. Eddie lists all of her favorite things to the point where they both decide they are best friends now. Chica can joke for days and Beatrix laughs at each and every one. And when they end up on the back patio watching the sun rise, cursing their all nighter, Iris weaves their hands together.

Beatrix thinks, this is too much like coming home.

And then she thinks, screw being worthy of her gift, screw being right. She may not be the best person for what the speed force wants--that she will never know for sure. But she will protect what she has--these people who are family, this place that is home. The weight on her chest loosens as she thinks, this, this is enough for her.


	2. The More Things Change

They all stop by Jitters before starting the day. Everyone is tired -- the adrenaline from their night has worn off and so need lots of coffee and carbs to keep going. Tony finds he difficult to keep focusing on the road as he drives there.

Beatrix, despite Caitlin’s initial worries, has not thrown up once, and declares herself to still be hungry after three scones and a large coffee. Tony still just breathes a sigh of relief that she's here, that she's eating, superspeed and cosmic forces be damned. It doesn't matter if Beatrix was chosen for some grander purpose, she's still his girlfriend, the love of his life.

Caitlin, though, studies Beatrix with a critical eye. "I wonder if your metabolism was affected as well. We wouldn't really know while you were comatose as we wouldn't be intaking a normal amount of calories. On top of the fact that you may possess greater than human abilities which could necessitate a higher caloric intake...hmm..." She ends with a glint in her eye, which is normal for Caitlin, when she feels she's onto something.

"Do we have a way to measure how many calories I burn without sticking me in a special oven?" Beatrix asks.

Caitlin nods. "We'll be having you wear monitors for most of your tests anyway. And I really do need a blood sample--I can measure your blood glucose level for one thing, but we can look at others as well."

"It'd make sense though," says Eddie. "I mean if you can really..." he pauses and then looks around, lowers his voice, "do the thing then you're really like a high powered athlete. Swimmers and runners have to eat an enormous amount of calories so they can continue at their peak."

Tony's always grateful for Eddie. They've never had any beef between them like him and Iris, so they could start with a clean slate. But he always brings things down to a level that Tony understands and always around to common sense. Caitlin and Chica (and Beatrix) want to innovate, discover, make the whole world new. Eddie sees what he has to works with and uses what he knows to make the leaps and bounds he needs. Beatrix is an athlete in this case, albeit one with superpowers. Of course she needs to eat more.

"Good thing I'm Italian," says Tony. "We love all of the calories."

"Food has always been at the center of our relationship." Beatrix bats her eyelashes at him until he leans over and kisses her. "But I love you for more than your cooking."

Tony all but feels the temperature in the room drop, and realizes they're in front of Caitlin -- he immediately feels like a prick. "I love you too, hon," he says, clearing his throat. "We should probably get going though, Dr. Wells will be in soon."

Chica, who is Caitlin's best friend and also knows what's going on, points at him. "You're a genius. Caitlin, you remember everyone's order--you tell the barista what he likes, and I'll pay?"

"Sure," says Caitlin, blinking a little like she had just woken up.

"We'll get the truck started," says Tony as he rises out of his seat, taking Beatrix's hand.

Iris and Eddie rise with them. Eddie brought his own car and heads toward it Iris with him. They hold each other for a moment and then kiss goodbye. Tony watches them and squeezes Beatrix's hand. "I'm sorry about that. It’s just Caitlin -- she's been through a lot, these past few months," says Tony, slowly, as Iris makes her way toward them. He opens the passenger door to the truck. "So she doesn’t really like watching PDA between other people. It gets her upset. And well, I don't know that I can tell you what."

"Say no more," says Beatrix. She squeezes his hand back. "It's okay. No PDA in front of Caitlin. I understand."She plucks his keys from his jean pocket and starts the truck from her seat. "C'mon," she says. "Get in here so we don't let all the hot air out."

Chica and Caitlin exit Jitters with coffee and head to Caitlin's car with a wave to let them know they're rolling out. Iris takes it as a sign and finishes saying goodbye to Eddie. She slides in the back seat, and snuggles down into the cushion, promptly falling asleep as they drive toward STAR Labs. Beatrix shakes her head with a fond smile and taps out a rhythm on Tony's knee.

"What?” he asks.

"She never could stay awake for long in the back seat of the car," says Beatrix barely above a murmur. Tony has to remind himself to look at the road and not her blinding smile. "I was kind of surprised she managed yesterday."

"She loves you," says Tony. This he knows for certain--Beatrix had told him of her crush on Iris, how it had slowly abated over the years. But he's spent the last few seasons with just Iris, without Beatrix, and he can tell that there's something more than fraternal love that Iris has for Beatrix. Tony had started to worry that when she woke she wouldn't want him anymore. Not with Iris a step behind him. And when he says that Iris loves Beatrix, he knows what he means, even if Beatrix doesn't.

And Beatrix just gives him another one of those blinding smiles.

Iris startles awake as they pull into STAR Labs where Chica and Caitlin wait leaning against Caitlin's lime green monstrosity. They walk to the Cortex together. Tony can feel Beatrix vibrating as they hold hands--literally vibrating, not just fidgeting as she was prone to do.

Dr. Wells frowns at them as they enter. "Good morning," he says.

"We hope it's alright that we're here," says Iris, nodding to him. "Tony and I just wanted to be here for Barry."

Wells only shrugs. "You are always welcome here, Ms. West, Mr. Woodward. I don't know how exciting or turbulent a day of blood work and exercise will be but you are welcome all the same."

They all trade looks.

"Unless I'm missing something?" Wells asks as he notices their attempt to wordlessly communicate.

"There may be more we need to test," says Beatrix, stepping forward just a hair.

"Such as?" Dr. Wells asks as he leans forward.

Tony resists the urge to roll his eyes. Beatrix's and Wells' attraction to each other was to be expected, but had no basis in anything--not like her and Iris. He can’t really blame Beatrix subconsciously pursuing a fantasy of a celebrity crush, but he _can_ be annoyed with Wells for reacting to a female patient half his age though.

Here, it seems Chica can no longer contain herself. "Beatrix can run super fast. Like, really, really, really fast."

Wells leans back in his chair. "I take it you don't mean in an athletic way?"

They all mutually shake their heads.

"Ah," says Wells. There's a certain light in his eyes, similar to how Caitlin looks when she wants to test something. "For that test might I propose that we move to a more suitable location to allow Ms. Allen to move?"

Dr. Wells proposes an abandoned Air Field for the test, which means they spend about an hour collecting anything and everything they might need, before take nearly another hour to fight traffic on over, followed by another hour of calibrations and pretests. He can tell this is exciting to a scientist because Caitlin, Chica, and Wells have just started getting excited as Beatrix exits their trailer in a too tight track suit (and not for the reason Tony gets when he sees her in a too tight track suit. And that suit is... damn, Tony hadn't realize how nice Beatrix looks like tight form fitting clothes, and he's forgotten how pretty she is when she blushes. She turns completely scarlet as she catches his gaze.

Tony leans over to Francisca. "How attached are you to that suit?"

Chica scrunches up her nose and bops him on the head with her tablet. "You are gross, and I hate you. Mostly because your girlfriend does look pretty amazing right now."

Iris, meanwhile, actually fell asleep mid collecting of all the stuff and has now awoken from a substantial nap. She follows Beatrix out of the trailer and asks, "Did I miss it?”

"We're doing the final calibrations now," says Chica biting her lip.

"Do you really think you can run that fast?" Caitlin asks as she pokes some of the sensors Beatrix wears and matches it with lines on her tablet.

"Well," says Beatrix, with a casual shrug. "I guess we'll find out."

"Ready when you are," says Chica when she hits her last few buttons.

Tony just grins at her, then pulls Beatrix into his arms. "Kiss for luck?" he asks.

"I don't know if I need luck right now," says Beatrix wriggling her eyebrows at him. "Besides, aren't we meant to be behaving."

"Well, if you really do have super powers," says Caitlin, still poking the modules on Beatrix's suit, "I suppose you ought to be able to have sex."

Barry nods along innocently as if Tony had not word vomited about Caitlin’s discomforts just an hour ago. "That's good to know. Thank you."

Caitlin nods and calls for Chica when she's done, who fits Barry with a helmet and camera, and then they declare her good to go.

Beatrix nods. She turns to Tony with that blinding smile and kisses him like she's going off to war. He watches her walk to the edge of their little science camp wishing he could enjoy how her butt looks more--but the overwhelming feeling like she is walking into some kind of fight, some kind of destiny a cosmic entity assigned to her, weighs him down.

All of them take a step back as Barry approaches what they define as their starting line. It takes Beatrix a minute to get going though, so they wait and then watch. Then, in an instant Beatrix is no longer there -- instead a blur moves from her place and is now speeding around the track set up over the airfield.

"That's impossible," Caitlin says when she gasps at the sight.

Chica just whoops and throws her hands in the air.

Iris just gapes, before she starts laughing.

Tony's mesmerized as well, as he thinks, she was right, about the speed, about everything. "My girl's got super speed!" he cries. Of course, when he does Beatrix knocks right into the barrels and sandbags they were using to outline the course. "Oh shi--" says Tony as he runs to her.

Everyone's right behind him, even Dr. Wells is zooming a long, but Beatrix meets them before they can even get halfway to her. "My arm," she says, holding it at an odd angle.

Caitlin wraps an arm around her and shepherds her away to her medical supplies so she can splint the bone. "I think you might hate me," says Caitlin. "But I don't think I'm gonna be able to give you an anesthetic if I'm right about your metabolism."

Of course, Caitlin shoots up her with local anesthetic anyway, but Beatrix feels her move the bones back into place before Caitlin sets the splint. It hurts to look at her, but somehow that Beatrix refuses to cry out makes it all the more painful. And then, for all they took the time to set up the test, there's not much more they can do, so they load up and head back to the lab.

When they get there, Caitlin takes scans of Beatrix's arm while Dr. Wells and Chica analyze the data of their short lived experiment. Caitlin frowns at the data, muttering and mumbling.

Tony ambles over to her and looks over her shoulder. "Have you found a way to explain how she broke her arm after she just got out of a coma?"

"I won't need to," says Caitlin, pointing to the picture on her tablet. "What's that look like to you?"

"A bone...?" says Tony, squinting at the white line on black.

Caitlin rolls her eyes at him, She presses a few buttons and the picture appears on the monitors. "Okay, but have you ever seen a broken bone x-ray before."

"I have," says Tony with a small shrug."But it's been a while."

"Well, for one thing," says Beatrix pointing at the x-ray. "Isn't that bone supposed to be broken?"

Tony stares at the picture and realizes that Beatrix is right -- he's no doctor of course, but the lines that show on a bone broken as dramatically as Beatrix's was aren't so subtle that he'd miss it completely. "Is that... Is that Beatrix?" he asks

Caitlin nods. "You healed a severe fracture in less than two and a half hours," she says. "Everything about you -- the speed, the healing, the metabolism -- it's like you're super primed to go fast now."

"But, will it hurt her?" Iris asks, studying the picture of the bone. "I mean, if she's primed to go fast, will she start aging more quickly?"

"Thankfully no," says Caitlin with a bright smile. "I think the super healing is a side effect of the cellular regeneration, which is actually keeping Beatrix in a prime state of being. If anything, you might start aging more slowly now."

"Woah," says Beatrix, her eyes going wide. She looks down at her hands. "My life just become an episode of Stargate."

The room pauses for a second.

Then Chica asks, "Okay, but like, SG1 or Atlantis? I assume you don't mean Universe, because that one was a downer from the beginning."

There's another beat before everyone bursts out laughing. Chica grins and wiggles her eyebrows at them all. "Hey man, I'm just saying, very different tones between the two."

Caitlin wants more blood and other samples, and Dr. Wells really wants another test, but Beatrix's stomach growls, signaling an end to the day.

"Can we expect you tomorrow?" Dr. Wells asks.

"Sure," says Beatrix, with a nod. "And I'll be sure to bring some trail mix as well."

Chica and Caitlin have other work to do, and Iris has a shift at Jitters. They drop Iris off before stopping to get chimichangas. Beatrix has devoured hers and half of Tony's by the time they get home. Tony would complain but when they get home, Beatrix has this look in her eye. The kind of look that makes Tony forget all his worries, all his strife, and the other half of the chimichanga.

The second they are in the door, Tony sweeps her into his arms and carries her up the first flight of stairs. Beatrix laughs and demands to be let down for the second flight. She races upstairs, accidently at superspeed and then calls after him, "Tooooonnnnyyy! I'm getting naked without you!"

Tony runs up the steps after her, shaking the old house. He resists the urge to strip out of his clothes until he gets to the threshold of his room, or he knows he’ll never hear the end of it from Eddie and Chica (and Iris, who practically lives here anyway). Tony leaves his jacket in the doorway, and pulls his shirt over his head. When he throws it on the ground, he sees her for the first time. She has an arm wrapped around her breasts and her legs crossed, but Beatrix is 100% naked on their bed.

Tony crawls in, on top of her, melting as they both reach for a kiss. Tony gets hard again as he rocks against her while he give himself over to her mouth and her body. Beatrix flips them over as they kiss and goes after his belt buckle, and then the button to his jeans. She pulls them down with a fury before crawling back on top of him.

Tony kisses her with everything that's in him -- with all of the love and hope and longing he had built up over the past months without her. How he had wanted, day and night to hold her. And now she was here in his arms again, like they had never been apart. Tony pulls back to look at her, just to look for a moment. Beatrix smiles at him and hair falls into her eyes. Tony brushes it back and lets his thumb fall across her cheek. "You are so incredible," he says, mesmerized by her. "And I am so in love right now."

"I don't think I'll ever stop being in love with you," says Beatrix, leaning over to kiss his hand.

Tony moves his hand away from her mouth so that he might kiss her proper again. He pulls back with a jolt when he remembers something. "Shit," he says.

"What's the matter?" Barry asks.

"Wait here a second?" Tony asks, getting up from the bed. Hopefully, Eddie won't be randomly hope in the middle of the day. He's not, for which Tony thanks God, as Tony roots around his room a little, searching for some necessary equipment. Luckily, Eddie was an organized guy, and he keeps his condoms in his bedside drawer. He returns victorious holding them up.

Beatrix laughs at the sight of them. "That's very kind of you, lover."

"Well, I know you don't like doing it without them." Tony shrugs. He thinks she hid the freak out she had from their one time at unprotected sex -- she must have freaked out if she walked to a pharmacy hung over and bought the morning after pill. She doesn't know he knows that of course, not that Tony went snooping, he just found the bag for the medicine while cleaning. One night when he and Chica and Eddie had gotten drunk over the past months, he'd confessed to the whole thing, confessed that they might've had a baby, confessed that he'd wished she had.

Chica had started talking over him before he could even finish about how Plan B was just extra birth control, it was the same thing as wearing a condom -- it didn't stop a conception once it had happened. Then she had gone on about how it was Beatrix's body and she would have a baby with Tony when she was ready for a baby and not before then. Tony had says that he knew that -- he wouldn't force her or something. It's just... He wants kids, is that wrong? No, Chica had said. But it's one thing to want them, and another to make your spouse uncomfortable with the wanting of them. And the whole thing had stood out to Tony, because he'd never thought about it that way -- that he might be making Beatrix uncomfortable. That even if she did want kids -- and she had told him that she wanted kids, so Tony was going to believe her -- that not planning it, that getting taken by surprise might not be the best feeling to her.

And the way Beatrix grins at him when he says that is worth all the thought Tony put into it. She bounces her way over to him pulling him in for a kiss and back over to the bed. Beatrix takes the condoms from him, tossing one on the side table, and taking the other out of its wrapper.

"I've dreamed about this, you know?" says Tony, as she puts the condom on him.

"Sex?" she says with a smile. "Well, you are only twenty-six, I mean, that' still to be expected."

He smacks her ass because Beatrix knows that's not what he means.

"Ow!" Beatrix says through a laugh.

Tony bites at her neck and huffs in her ear, "Here I am trying to be romantic."

"Okay, okay, I'm listening," says Beatrix.

"Well, while you were dreaming about cosmic forces and destinies and shit, I was dreaming about you," says Tony. He makes sure the condom is secure before he adjusts them both, making sure they'll be more comfortable as they fit together. He eases inside of her -- it has been nine months after all. "I was dreaming of your eyes, and your smile, and yeah, dreaming about this.

Beatrix holds him close and lets out a low groan as he begins to move his hips in a rhythm that's almost become unfamiliar. "Oh, Tony, Tony..." she says.

"I've been waiting for you, this whole time," he says. Tony kisses her neck and sinks his fingers into her hip and her bottom, holding her while he makes love to her. "God, Trix, I'm so glad I'm not dreaming. I'm so glad you're really here."

Beatrix wraps her arms around him as well, looking him in the eye as she says, "I'm here, baby, I'm really here. I love you so fucking much, Tony."

"Oh my God, Trix, I love you too," says Tony.

After that they don't talk much. Right now, for them both, it's more about being there, with each other, holding each other. Tony takes it slow -- it's weird, he thinks, it's kind of the opposite of that first time they were together. The whole thing then was about getting off, and getting off right then. Now it's about being with her -- and getting off, but mostly just being with her at that moment. Sex was just one way of him being here with her, of making their love real. It wasn’t the only way, of course, but in Tony’s humble opinion it definitely ranks as the most fun.

Tony grins down at her as he leans in for a kiss, biting a little at Beatrix’s lip as he does. As he keeps pumping his hips back and forth, Beatrix responds by biting onto Tony’s neck. Tony trades her back by running his tongue across her collarbone. Beatrix digs her fingers into his ass (which, yeah, Tony digs). They test each other’s flesh against expectation, finding out if everything remains the same after so much time.

Things come to a head when Tony’s fingers rub her clit in circles, and Tony has no idea how she’s done it, but Beatrix has her fingers right against his perineum doing the same thing. And then her fingers start to vibrate.

“Fuck,” he says, cumming hard. As he cums and cums, he rubs her clit, maybe a little too hard, but has her losing to the brink of orgasm before he finishes his own.

He collapses on top of her for a minute, and Beatrix takes his weight without complaint while they both catch their breath.

"So, just out of curiosity." Tony turns at the sound of the voice and sees Eddie standing in the doorway, a wide grin on his face. "Did you steal my condoms?"

"I owe you two dollars," says Tony, looking around him for something to chuck at Eddie's insufferably blond head. "Can't you see we're having a moment dude?"

"I can see your pasty, Italian ass, something which I have seen before," says Eddie, grin unfazed. "And maybe that'll teach you both to close the door the next time you get busy. And I suggest you two wrap up, because your dad's here, Trix."

"Joe-dad?" Beatrix asks from where she lies beneath Tony.

"Yep," says Eddie. He reaches for the door handle and closes their door behind him. When he closes it, Tony can hear him talking to Onyx who meows loudly in return.

Tony pulls out of her, holding onto the condom as he does. "Just when I think we're getting a little break from it all..." he mumbles.

"We should probably stop expecting a break," says Beatrix. She scoots across the bedspread, not even bothering to go around the glaring wet spot and takes his face in her hands. Beatrix holds him still while she kisses him sweetly. "I love you, Tony Woodward. Just in case you forgot."

"I love you too, Beatrix Allen," he says kissing her back. Tony pulls her close into a hug. "Oh God, I could never deserve you, Trix."

"You'll never have to," she says. Beatrix pulls away from their hug and kisses his cheek. "C'mon. I don't wanna subject Eddie to Joe alone for longer than we have to."

Tony snorts -- he should have a little more sympathy for Eddie, given that he doesn't want to be left alone in Joe's company for very long either. He supposes that's a product of Joe thinking that no one's ever going to be good enough for his daughters. Still, Eddie's one of his best friends at this point, so he picks up his shorts and pants off of the floor and pulls them on while Beatrix does the same. She pulls on her tee shirt, slipping her fingers under her hair at the nape of her neck and flipping it over the collar. When they are both dressed, she reaches out for his hand, which Tony takes. They walk from the room and down the stairs to their living room hand in hand.

Joe smiles at Beatrix, only faltering briefly when his eyes land on Tony. "Hi, baby," he says with the same affection he reserves for Iris.

Beatrix finally lets go of his hand to walk into Joe's outstretched arms. "Hey Joe. Did you guys wrap the bank robbery?"

"Mmm, no not yet," says Joe.

Beatrix pulls back from him squinting and suspicious. "Wait, am I even allowed to be called in for processing right now?"

All three men laugh. Oh poor Beatrix, who couldn't help but be the best at what she did. Joe releases Beatrix from the hug, but keeps an arm around her to keep her close.

"Ah, no," says Eddie, with a grin. "But we were about to check out leads and since the house was on the way we stopped by. Hey, here's a question for you though, Trix. How likely is it to survive a plane crash?"

Beatrix tosses her head back and forth considering the question. "Depends on the plane, the altitude, flying conditions, what they crashed into, if the flyer bailed before impact -- if they had a 'shoot of course." She laughs as she cuts herself off and looks at Eddie's face. "Oh, sorry. I -- uh -- do that sometimes."

Eddie gets over his stupor quickly and grins at her. "I've heard the legends, but now I see they are true." He pulls a sketch from his pocket and hands it over to her, only to have Joe snatch it away. "Hey, Joe, c'mon, she's not a bum on the street."

"She's still not apart of this investigation and still on medical leave," says Joe with a frown, folding then tucking the page into his pocket

"Clyde Mardon was in a plane crash?" Beatrix asks, unfazed by Joe's behavior.

Tony thinks, it should bother her more.

Eddie nods. "The night the accelerator went off. He and Mark both."

"And he's been spotted -- what, robbing that bank yesterday?" asks Beatrix, her brow furrowing.

Her eyes are dilating and there are only a few things that do that for her: normal responses to light, Tony, and a good crime to solve.

Joe opens his mouth to object, but Eddie powers through. "And this afternoon, witnesses spot the same guy stealing a mustang, crashing it on the freeway and walking away while a freak fog rolls in. Of course, we lose him in the fog."

"Eddie!" says Joe, frown firmly in place. "Seriously, that's enough now. Sorry, baby, but we do have some crime scenes to check out. I don't want you worrying about anything though." He pulls her in for another hug, which Beatrix allows, mouthing to Eddie over his shoulder to text her the details. Eddie nods and pulls out his phone. Joe pulls back and smiles. "Now, take it easy and let your boy cook for you, understand."

Beatrix nods with a smile while Tony's phone chirps with an incoming text message (Eddie must have realized he didn't have Beatrix's number or Beatrix didn't have a phone). "Of course, Joe. Be safe, the both of you."

Beatrix waits until the door is shut behind him before she takes the phone Tony offers out to her and begins to look through the case file Eddie has sent her. As she looks through her face slowly goes from intrigued to blank.

"What's the matter?" Tony asks.

"I think we need to go to STAR Labs," she says, handing him back the phone. "I'd like to have a little chat with Dr. Wells."

"What's a matter?" Tony gets a little closer to her and takes her into his arms.

"We're not the only one that were changed that night." She taps away at his phone and pulls up a video of the bank robbery that Joe and Eddie investigated yesterday. The video shows a young man, probably not much older than them, standing in the eye of a wind storm -- a wind storm inside the bank.

"Is he doing what I think he's doing?" Tony looks at the video, the grainy camera phone feed, and even to him it seems undeniable. But he still asks because he can't quite believe it.

"Yeah, I think he is," she says.

Tony looks at her and nods. "Get your coat," he says.

Beatrix raises an eyebrow at him, and in the blink of an eye she has hers and his in her hands, along with their shoes. Tony's not quite as fast as her, but they're out in the truck in a few minutes, driving off to STAR Labs.


	3. Leaps or Something Like Them

Beatrix leads the way into the building, not quite running at super speed, but she can practically feel the air displace as Tony stretches his long legs to keep up with her. She doesn't know why she's so angry, especially since she knew there had to be others when Tony showed her his skin. But something about there being someone else, someone else who was not trying to hide their ability, that makes Beatrix think there has to be evidence of other people with superhuman abilities. As a CSI she knows that if enough evidence builds up after a while you can't ignore it. Maybe that's why she's angry -- because Francisca and Caitlin and Dr. Wells have been acting like this is such a surprise for them. Really they ought to have known all along that Beatrix might have developed into something more. And if they knew, they've been lying to her. Or at the very least they've been withholding what they know.

She walks into the cortex with Tony at her back and both Caitlin and Chica look up at her surprised. "Are you hurt at all?" Caitlin asks, walking toward them

"No," says Beatrix, stepping further into the lab. "But I wanted to talk to all three of you."

Dr. Wells presses a button on his wheelchair, urging it forward from where he had been in a smaller space off the main room. "Is there something the matter, Miss Allen?"

"As a matter of fact there is," says Beatrix, nodding at him. "Eddie wanted my opinion on a case he and Joe have been working. That bank robbery from yesterday. It certainly seems like from the evidence Eddie shared with me that a very dangerous man has developed meterokenesis."

"Meteoro --" Chica mumbles, and then looks up her brown eyes wide. "He controls the weather? Dude, are you serious."

"Yeah." Beatrix nods, but before anyone can get too excited she adds, "And now that very dangerous man is now running around Central City hurting people to steal money and fast cars." She pauses for a second while she licks her lips and asks, "How many people were affected by the particle accelerator?"

Dr. Wells clears his throat and says, "Miss Allen, I'm sure you can appreciate that there were many people harmed by this machine--"

"That's not what I meant, and you know it," says Beatrix cutting him off, leveling herself to look into Dr. Wells' bright blue eyes.

There's another pause in the room, the air turning thick. Caitlin breaks it after a moment and says, "We don't know how many metahumans there are."

"Metahumans?" Tony asks from behind her. He comes up and slips his hand into hers, and Beatrix takes it, holding him tight.

"That's what we've been calling them," says Caitlin, with a short nod. "Like Dr. Wells says there were people who were injured or even died in the explosion. But there were people who were... changed. Like you, Beatrix. Only, we have no way of knowing who was changed or how many."

"Caitlin and I were right outside the blast doors when it hit," says Chica, her eyes hollow and her voice scratchy. "And so far, nothing's happened to us. But we've starting noticing anomalies. Just under sixty in the past nine months."

Beatrix tries to focus on the racing of her heart instead of the anger boiling up inside of her. "And no one else knows?"

"We thought it might be best until evidence could be collected," says Dr. Wells. His fingers dig into the arm of his wheelchair. Something about his ramrod straight posture and the way his gaze does not waiver makes Beatrix think he's lying to her.

She nods. "Right then. I'll be back."

Tony follows her out of the lab, catching her by her coat sleeve as she makes her way to the elevator. "What? Where are we going now?"

Tony watches as all of the anger melts out of her, and she turns to him. Beatrix scrubs a hand through her hair. "I'm sorry. I just. I need to talk to someone who's been down this road already, who's made the decision I'm about to make."

"To go after Clyde Mardon, you mean," says Tony looking at her. He takes her in for a minute and then asks, "I can't come with you, can I?"

"No," says Beatrix, gently. "But only because I have to run across the country, and I'm not sure I can carry you that far just yet."

Caitlin huffs from where she stands. "What a minute: who do you know that can give you advice on if you should go around trying to use your superpowers to catch criminals or not?"

"The Arrow," says Beatrix, with a grin. She turns back to Tony licking her lips. "I never got a chance to tell you that I met the Arrow when I went to Starling last... year."

"Sweet," says Chica, a grin plastered on her face. She then turns a little dark and nibbles her lip. "We were gonna tell you. It was just, we thought it was a lot to take in, you know?"

"I believe you," says Beatrix with a small shrug.

"So," says Tony, drawing her attention back to him. "You're just going to run to Pennsylvania to get the advice of a vigilante you met a few months ago?"

Beatrix pretends to consider it for a moment before she says, "That was the plan."

Tony shakes his head and leans down to kiss her. "Okay," he says when he breaks away, resting his forehead on hers. "Come back quick, and know that I believe you. I always will."

Beatrix nods kissing him back. When she pulls away, she says, “You can take the elevator. I’m gonna take the stairs.”

Tony is about to ask what she means, because they’re in a subbasement, but before he an get a word out, all he’s left with is a shock to his lips and empty space where Beatrix once was. “I’d say, ‘godspeed,’” he says turning to Chica and Caitlin. “But I don’t think she needs anymore.”

 

The only thing that stops Beatrix on her run to Starling City is her coat catching fire. She stops for a instant, pulling it off and stomping on it on the side of the road before she continues to run. She finds Oliver on top of a building, almost by chance. Beatrix had been ready to scour the whole city.

He's on top of a building not far from the Foundry and fixes on her as she runs up the building to him.

"Hi," says Beatrix.

"Did you just..." Oliver trails off not quite sure how to complete his sentence.

Beatrix looks over her shoulder where a few sparks remain in her wake. "Run up the building, yeah I think I did." She turns back to him with a smile.

Oliver draws back his hood and smiles. "So, you're looking well. You seem a little less comatose than when I last saw you."

"Aw," says Beatrix, "you came to visit?"

"Yeah," says Oliver. He smiles back at her now. "Just discreetly."

"Discreetly... meaning with the hood on?"

Oliver laughs. "Yeah. Listen, I have to ask. Did I really, really just see you run up that building at what could only be described as superhuman speed?"

"Yeah," says Beatrix as she ducks her head. "I actually came to talk to you about that."

Oliver raises an eyebrow. "Do you want it to end? I do know some people who could possibly help with that."

Beatrix blows air through her lips, bit a huff not a sigh, but somewhere in between. "I actually hadn't considered that. I came here to ask about..." she trails off waving her hand from top to bottom at his costume. "This."

Oliver smiles again, shaking his head. "You wake up from a coma, discover you have superpowers and the first thing you do is decide you want to fight crime?"

"I slept with my boyfriend first, if that helps?"

Oliver outright laughs at her omission. "Well, the Beatrix Allen I met several months ago, and have come to know by blogs and youtube videos --"

"Oh god, you saw all of that?"

Oliver continues undaunted, "And by the outpouring of love and fellowship by her many many friends over the last few months, well, that Beatrix Allen doesn't really have trouble sticking to the courage of her convictions. It seems to me that when you know you're right about something, you know you don't falter. What's so different about now?"

Beatrix considers this for a moment. "I don't..." she says after a moment. "I don't now that I'm right this time. I just... have this feeling my gut, backed up by a possible visit from a cosmic entity--" when Oliver's eyes go wide, she says, "And that's not important now. What I know is that I feel that I ought to do something with this gift I've been given. I feel I'm being pulled in that direction. And now someone else who has an equally awe defying gift might be using his to hurt others. And.. I want to help with that. But there are these voices in my head, like my foster father, or one of my own heroes that say I'm too fragile or that I'm too much more valuable than the people I could help to risk it." She sighs, scrubbing the heels of her hands over her eyes. "I just don't know, Oliver, if I can be some badass vigilante like you are. I don't know if I can be that person."

"So don't."

Oliver's swift response almost gives her a crick in the neck with how quickly she looks up. "What?"

"Beatrix, you don't have to be like me," says Oliver with the shake of his head. "Our trials, though they've been intense in their own rights, have been very different, and made us into different people. So, if you think you can't be like me, maybe that's for the best. Don't be the vigilante. Instead, be a hero -- be who you already are, someone who wants to do right by the world because you have a higher stake in it now. Listen to your voice, not the voice of your hero, or your father, or even the cosmic entity. You wanted to make a difference in the world before you gained, and I can't believe I'm saying this, superpowers. Now you have the ability to make a bigger sort of difference. As a hero. One who helps people, in a flash."

Beatrix can't help herself as she moves across the roof and wraps her arms around Oliver. Oliver tenses under her touch, but then wraps his arms around her too. “Thank you, Oliver,” she say.

“You’re welcome,” he says pulling back. Oliver smiles widely at her. “Now, if what you just says was as urgent as you just says, I’m not kicking you out, but you probably want to get home now."

"Yeah," she agrees, taking a step back. "I probably should." Beatrix watches him turn and go for a moment before she calls out, "Hey Arrow!"

Oliver turns and stares at her for a moment. "Yeah?"

Beatrix grins. "Nice mask!"

Oliver rolls his eyes at her even as Beatrix laughs. "Take your own advice and get one!" he says.

Still laughing, Beatrix turns and runs away, only pausing to watch Oliver take a leap off the building and swing away on a grappling line. "Cool," she breaths out. As she turns back west to Central City, she likes to think Oliver's saying the same thing about her.

It takes her another half hour to run back to Central and the autumn sun is just beginning to set in the west. She returns to STAR Labs, and Tony's waiting for her in the parking lot. His eyes go wide as she stops in front of him, stopping out the small flames that lick at her shoes. "Hi," she says.

"Hi," he says back, his eyes wide. "I see what Chica meant."

Beatrix squints at him. "Wait, what?"

Tony takes her by the hand and leads her inside. "It's probably easiest to let Chica explain."

They make their way down to where the cortex where both Chica and Caitlin wait for them. "Dr. Wells not crashing the party?" she asks, wondering if she should keep an ear out for him.

Caitlin shakes her head. "No, he left shortly after you did. Claimed he had a migraine."

Beatrix snorts. "Of course. Tony says you had something to show me, Chica?"

Chica nods, a shy grin forming over her face as she bounces back and forth on her heels. She walks over to her work station where she had a mannequin covered in red fabric. "So, a colleague designed this fabric and says I could knock myself out designing suits with it. Its heat and friction proof, and I was originally gonna fabricate a bunch to give to the local fire department, y'know to do something nice for the community. But," she snaps her fingers and points to Beatrix, "I figured speed and friction are things that happen together and if you're gonna fight crime, you'd probably prefer that your clothes didn't burn off while you did."

"It's a little bit of a rush job," Caitlin continues. "But we added in monitors like we had in your track suit to keep track of your vitals and make sure that you're not going into cardiac arrest or hypoglycemic shock. Speaking of which." Caitlin gestures to where Tony has appeared at Beatrix's elbow with a plate of what looks like granola bars. "They have a combination of necessary vitamins, minerals and calories to balance out your necessary intake. They have roughly 2000 calories each. Chica and I made them before you decided to become a superhero. But now would be a good time to eat them."

Beatrix takes out and bites out a large chunk. It tastes like medicine or sucking on a vitamin pill. She swallows it, though, because Chica and Caitlin worked hard on them. And they're right that she needs the calories.

Caitlin and Chica stare at her intently as she takes her second bite before they burst out laughing. "Yeah," says Chica. "They're not gonna win any awards for taste, but they'll keep you going. We'll work on the taste in the beta batch."

Beatrix swallows hard. "Thank you, both, for doing this. I know you probably didn't sign up to help fight crime when you joined a prestigious laboratory."

Chica and Tony freeze like they have when Beatrix has says something that she shouldn't have in front of Caitlin. Caitlin just shakes her head though. "I haven't signed up for a lot in the past year," she says. "But this. I am definitely signing up for this."

Beatrix, fresh from her interaction with Oliver, reaches over and holds her arms out to Caitlin. Caitlin swallows hard, getting rid of some tears, and walks into Beatrix's hug.

"Group hug?" Tony asks with a smile.

"Get over here, you two," says Caitlin.

Chica and Tony join their embrace, and they all hold onto each other for a moment. Beatrix has this electrified feeling in her veins, like something just began. After a few minutes, Caitlin pulls back and says, "Wait, do we even know where this guy is going to be?"

"I have a pretty good idea," says Beatrix, nodding. "There was a farm Mardon hid out right before he fled the city with this brother."

"Hey you think this guy can control the weather, right?" asks Chica.

"Yeah," says Beatrix.

"So...where ever he goes, he should effect the atmospheric pressure," says Chica. "I mean, if he's using his powers."

Caitlin grins at Chica. "We can re-task the satellites to check for a meteorological disturbance."

"Wait this place has satellites?" Tony asks.

"Bro, you don't even know the half," says Chica rushing to a computer station. She points at Beatrix. "Get changed, we're gonna confirm your guy is where you think he is."

Beatrix mock salutes and strides over to the mannequin. "If anyone has any problems with seeing me in my underwear should speak up now." She begins to strip out of her clothes when a lack of protests hits her. There's a pair of sport underwear and a sports bra that appear to be brand new and in her size. Beatrix decides that she doesn't want to know how Chica got them and just puts them on, before pulling on the suit. For all it looks like leather, it slides on a lot more easily than leather does. She tugs on the pants, then zips up the jacket, then pulls the boots up one at a time. She holds off on the cowl and gloves, because she has to do something about her hair. For a second, Beatrix debates just cutting it all off. Instead, she sections it off and begins two french braids braided close to her skull. Tony takes the other half of her hair and begins to do the same.

Caitlin jump ups when she sees her and pulls a small case from her purse, pulling out hair pins. "Want some help?"

"Yes please," Beatrix says.

Caitlin is a third set of hands who begins to pin the braids in places and takes the ends and begins to pin them weaving around her scalp so that her hair lays flat. It's only then that Beatrix pulls on her gloves, and pulls the cowl over her face to cover it up. "Do I look as silly as I feel?" she says trying to avoid giggling.

"No," says Tony. His voice makes her realize just how quiet he's been this whole time. "You look like a superhero." He looks at her, his eyes hard in a way like she's never seen before. "I want to come with you."

"I don't know how advanced Mardon's powers are," she says quietly. "And I don't know what I'll be able to do against him."

"I know," says Tony, nodding at her. "And that's why I don't want you going alone. I want to watch your back."

Beatrix doesn't know if he does it on purpose. Beatrix thinks Tony doesn't know if he's done it on purpose. But in that moment, his skin shimmers and covers over with a layer of iron, even over his face and eyes. Beatrix's breath catches in her throat, and she can't help but think how... well, how magnificent and fierce he looks. Beatrix thinks if she were fighting him, and didn't have him at her back, she might actually be afraid.

"Dude..." says Chica, her mouth on the floor.

Caitlin looks just as shocked. "You... you're a meta too, Tony?"

Tony looks down at his hands, and then a smile comes to his face when he realizes what's happened. "Yeah, yeah I am."

Chica recovers first, pointing at him. "You need a mask!" she hops up from the computers and begins rummaging through her work station, pulling out a black domino mask out of her drawers.

"...You just had that ready to go?" he asks.

“Yep,” she says.

“Why do you just have a spare mask on hand?" Tony asks, as Chica comes at him with a bottle of adhesive.

"Always keep your scraps and your test pieces," says Chica. She looks him up and down and says, "Can you, like, undo the metal for a sec? The adhesive is made for skin."

Tony presses his lips together in concentration and then the metal melts away from his face and down his body until his skin is revealed. Tony bends forward so Chica can reach his face more easily. She spreads the adhesive around his eyes, directly Tony to keep them close before she spreads the mask over his face. Chica steps away and nods at her work. Tony's face is slightly changed by the mask, and his brown eyes are covered by a thin layer of white material that blocks out the color of his eyes.

"Well?" Tony asks. "How do I look?"

"Like you're ready not to be recognized," says Chica.

Tony smiles, but looks down at his arms. "Probably should hide the tattoos later on."

A ding resounds through the lab.

Caitlin and Chica race over to the computers.

"Hey was this safe house a farm out by the river?"

"Closes cross streets 175th and George?" Beatrix asks as she and Tony look over their shoulders.

Caitlin grins at them. "It looks like we just got a ping."

Chica hands them earbuds that send and receive communications. Beatrix and Tony settle them in their ears before Beatrix turns to him and says, "Are you ready?"

"As I'll ever be," he says. Tony starts to say, "Hey,"

but when he finishes the last sound in "be," Beatrix has already picked him up and is racing out of the labs. She has her arms under his knees and around his back like he had done for her just yesterday. Beatrix works fast though -- she's good at fast now. She ran to Starling in half an hour, running five miles to the old farm house takes fifteen seconds, tops. When she puts him down, Tony has finished the word, "hey," but looks slightly stunned as if he didn't know what he was expecting.

"Sorry," she says to Tony.

He pants for a moment and then grins at her. "That was weird, but cool. I was gonna ask how we were gonna get here, and then here we are." He looks at the barn. "Think he's in there?"

"Only place around with some sort of cover, so yeah," says Beatrix. She wishes she had been on some police raids so she would know how to work this. Then again, police raids often ended in shootouts in this town, so maybe her lack of knowledge was for the best. Thinking of which made her realize that Mardon probably had a gun. "He's got to be armed," she says to Tony. "So you might want to... coat yourself."

"Iron up sounds less like a sex thing," says Chica in their ears making them both jump.

Even as the metal flows over his skin Tony laughs and says, "Depends on the sex thing." He pauses and looks back to Beatrix. "So, how do we play this?"

Raiding the place like the police was out. So... "We should try deescalation first. I'm pretty sure he's not going to have some kind of master plan that he'll be sticking to. The Mardons were always described as loose cannons -- their type of robbery usually involved threatening people to do what they wanted."

"So do we de-escalate someone who's flying by the seat of their pants?" Tony asks.

"It looks like he's responded well when he's in therapy," says Caitlin from across the comes. "He's been successfully put on medication in the past, but whenever he's outside the prison system he goes off of them when he runs out."

"And you know this, because?" Beatrix asks.

"We'll just say it has nothing to do with the patient profiles that we hacked from Iron Heights just now," says Chica. Beatrix can hear her grinning over the line.

"But basically, normal conversation should work. No sudden shifts and you stand a good chance," says Caitlin.

"All these super powers and we're gonna go talk to the guy," says Tony nodding along. "Okay. Let's go then."

They walk toward the barn and as soon as they cross the threshold, they see Clyde Mardon sitting on a stool in the center of the barn floor, staring at the ground. Tony and Beatrix exchange a look. Not really off to the best start.

"Clyde?" says Beatrix drawing his attention up from the floor.

Clyde Mardon looks up at them and blinks a few times. Then he rubs at his eyes. "You ain't cops," he says. "'r if you are, they've started dressin' y'all funny."

"We're not cops," says Tony. Beatrix can tell by a shuddered breath that he's holding back a laugh at Clyde's startled expression.

"We're like you, actually," says Beatrix. "Metahumans -- we've got powers too."

Clyde looks them over and nods. "Thought you looked like metal," he says to Tony. Then he jerks his head at Beatrix. "What do you do?"

"I'm fast," says Beatrix.

"Fast?" says Clyde.

"Yeah," says Beatrix. Before she thinks on it too hard, she remembers an ice cream stand she saw a mile back on their run in. In three seconds she's gone, then in another three she's back with three ice cream cones in her hand. She gives one to Tony and then offers one out to Clyde.

Clyde stares at the ice cream cone for a minute but then takes it, licking at the cold treat. He swallows and laughs. "It's been years since I've had an ice cream." He looks up and stares at her, eyes fixed for a good minute. "Thank you."

"You're welcome," says Beatrix, before she devours her own ice cream.

Clyde licks at his ice cream. "So, you ain't cops. But people who get people ice cream don't strike me as bad guys, even if you did steal this," he says. "You here to take me into a place that'll actually hold people like us? Or maybe talk me into some sort of superhero team?"

"Why, you wanna be a superhero?" Tony asks, around a mouthful of ice cream.

"Don't think I'd be much good at it," says Clyde with a shrug.

"Mostly, we just came to see... well, to see if you're okay," says Beatrix, licking the remaining drop of ice cream off of her glove. Her face sours at the taste of the material. Not pleasant.

Clyde snickers at her. "Gee that was some face. But you're tell me you're just wanting to make sure that I'm okay? Not like I'm gonna go off stealing and murdering no more?"

Tony just shrugs. "We're checking up on both. Wanted to make sure you were okay first."

Clyde stares at Tony for a moment and then stares at Beatrix. Beatrix tries not to tense as he assesses them. After a long moment, Clyde shrugs and declares, "You two are fucking weird. I dunno if I'm okay. I never do, really, 'cept when they've got me on something. But I guess I realized that what I did was stupid and stuff. Mark was always the smarter of the two of us. So, no, I'm not gonna keep murdering and stealing. I ain't know what I'm gonna do."

"Do you need help... like finding Mark, maybe?" ask Beatrix.

Clyde shrugged. "Always figured he'd find me. Like if I made a big enough ruckus he'd come." Clyde frowns. "He hasn't yet, though." He doesn't talk for a moment and instead focuses on finishing off the last of his ice cream. When he finishes the cone, Clyde stands up and says, "You two gonna send me to jail now?"

Before Beatrix or Tony can reply, rapid footsteps creep up on them. When Beatrix turns, she sees Joe and Eddie with their guns drawn. "Stand down where you are, we're CCPD," says Joe.

Beatrix raises her hands in the air. "Officers, please, we've got this situation handled. Don't turn this violent."

"You're not police," says Joe, staring her down. "you can't have this 'handled' because it's not yours to handle. The two of you can get on the ground too. I don't know if you're colluding with Mardon, or you're just here as vigilantes but both are gonna get you arrested."

Beatrix isn't quite sure what to do. The last thing she wants is for them to start firing. She's pretty sure with her accelerated healing she can survive a bullet wound, but Tony or Clyde may not. When she turns to Clyde though, she sees she may not have much choice in the matter. For Clyde's face as gone red and twisted. "Clyde?" she says. "Clyde, listen, you were gonna go with us to the police just a second ago."

"Yeah," says Clyde, "with YOU. Not with them. They ain't got no business talking to you like that. We're so much more powerful than them. And hell, you was just trying to do something good for me and for them, and he just spat it back in your face. Like he's gonna tell a god what to do."

"Man, shut the hell up," says Joe, pointing his gun right at Clyde. "And get on the ground."

Clyde's neck turns so swiftly to Joe she can hear his vertebra pop. "You shut up, old man," says Clyde, a gust of wind coming from behind him and blowing Joe straight out of the barn

As she sees Joe fly back, Beatrix runs after him, moving behind him to catch him as he flies back and then lay him on the ground before the hard earth can break bone or skin. Eddie Barrels out of the barn on his own gust of wind, and then Tony. Beatrix catches each of them in turn, though Tony knocks the care out of her more so than Eddie or Joe did.

To her shock, when Clyde comes next, he's floating, like he's walking on the air. "Well," he says, “you tried. But those people -- those people are always gonna see the wrong in people like me. I see that now. And soon they're gonna see the wrong in people like us. So I'm gonna give'em something wrong to see." As Clyde moves the wind gathers up, circling around him, and then before she knows it Beatrix is looking at a full blown tornado.

"Guys!" she says into her ear piece.

"We see it!" says Chica. "It's a category three tornado, pretty quickly turning into a category four."

"What do I do?" says Beatrix, all hope draining from her system.

"Try going in through the wind currents, to take him out," says Caitlin.

Beatrix nods and races off. She ducks and dodges the drafts as much as she can, but they're hard and there's too much. She gets knocked back after only half a minute. "Okay," she says into her earbud. "The direct approach is not working. What if... What if I try to unravel it? Like I run in the opposite direction?"

"You'd have to go fast," says Chica.

"That's the name of the game!" says Beatrix, feeling a grin form on her face.

"No, like really fast," says Chica. "like 700 miles per hour."

"Okay," says Beatrix. She sets her mark and then she begins to run.

Even though she's moving fast, it still feels like the world slows down just for her. As she runs faster and faster, the winds go from a gale force to bluster. Beatrix runs and she runs. She's almost got them under control when a tractor comes toward her, and Beatrix has to dodge out of the way, breaking her path around the tornado base. Other debris follows.Beatrix pauses, panting, watching the path of the tornado.

"I certainly hope you're not giving up so easily, Miss Allen," says a voice in her ear.

"Dr. Wells," she asks, putting a hand to her. "I didn't expect to hear you."

"I didn't expect to be here," he says. "And I'll have my full apology for how I behaved earlier later. For now, though, I would like to say, I believe you can do this. So now, you need to run, Barry, run."

Something about the cadence of the words, their rhythm and their rhyme spurs her on. Beatrix runs. She thinks of Eddie and Joe back at the barn, who are in imminent danger. She thinks of the people of Central City, who this tornado will destroy. She thinks of her father in iron heights who she still hasn't seen since waking up, of Caitlin and Chica and Dr. Wells in STAR Labs who are helping a virtual stranger start a crusade. She thinks of Tony, the love of her life, waiting for her. She thinks of the speed force and her mother who believe in her and it seems to be enough. The wind slows to a breeze and Barry runs faster, and faster, and faster.

The tornado disappears almost as quickly as it came. Clyde Mardon clearly does not expect the disappearance of the wind that held him aloft, for he falls from his height. Beatrix, still running, races just behind him on a remaining air current and catches him as they both tumble to the ground.

Both she and Clyde are on their knees, in the dirt, panting.

"Beatrix!" people shout in her ear.

"We're good," she says in return. "I've got him."

Chica and Caitlin cheer, and Tony just says, "We're coming your way."

“Why are you helping them?” Clyde asks, shaking his head at her. “You’re like me -- you should be on my side.”

“I _am_ on your side, Clyde,” she says, reaching out to him. Clyde lets her put her hands on his shoulders. “That’s why I had to stop the tornado. I wanna help you, but I can do that if you’re gonna try to destroy everything.”

“And why would you wanna help me?” says Clyde, reaching down to where he has a gun in his jacket.

Beatrix doesn’t even think about it when she pulls him in for a hug. “Because you were right, Clyde. We are the same. We’re both lost. And we’re both looking for a way out. I’m trying to find it, same as you.”

Clyde’s whole body tenses for the briefest moment, like he’s never had anyone touch him in a loving or gentle way. He relaxes ever so much as she hears him start to sniffle and snort. He wraps his arms around her as well, holding her close. He dries his eyes soon enough as the thumping footsteps of the men draw closer. “I don’t want them to touch me,” he says.

“Alright,” says Beatrix. “Stay down.” She draws away from him and gets to her feet. For the first time, Beatrix realizes her cowl has fallen in the fight. Looking Joe right in the eye she says to him, “Can I get a pair of handcuffs please?”

Joe, wordless, hands them over to her.

Beatrix cuffs Clyde with his hands behind his back. He doesn’t resist her, even when she pulls the gun out of his pocket and flicks the safety on before handing it over. “C’mon, then,” she says as she walks him over to Eddie and Joe’s car.

The others follow silently behind her.

Beatrix ducks him into a squad car, half convinced the only reason it works is because Clyde’s been arrested before and knows when to duck. Beatrix, before she closes the door, looks down at Clyde and says, "Please don't hurt them?"

Clyde, his eyes bloodshot and watery, looks up at her and only nods.

Beatrix closes the door and turns back to the men, who have followed her closely. She holds out the gun to Joe or Eddie, who ever takes it first. Eddie does -- Joe is still staring at her with something akin to awe or fright.

"Beatrix," Joe says to her. "What you can do... It was the lightning bolt?"

"More or less," she says.

Joe turns to Tony. "And what happened to you?"

"Vat of molten iron," says Tony, a little too matter of fact. His tone of voice makes a shiver run up Beatrix's spine.

Joe and Eddie, too, look a little shocked at this.

"We need to go," says Beatrix pulling up her cowl, she reaches out for Tony, who takes her hand. "We'll talk later."

Before she can speed off, Joe reaches out, saying, "Wait. Beatrix, whatever you do, please don't tell Iris."

Beatrix licks her lips. "Iris already knows, Joe."

Joe's face falls.

"We'll talk later," says Beatrix again. In a flash, she picks Tony up and runs off, back toward STAR Labs.

Later turns out to be the next day. Joe and Eddie are up late bringing in Mardon -- explaining the seemingly impossible circumstances, going over the scene with analysts, and writing reports.

Beatrix spends her night making a last minute run to the hardware store to build a ramp for Dr. Wells. Then, after getting a restful amount of sleep (which turns out to be about six hours), she wakes up early and starts cooking breakfast. Dr. Wells arrives sometime after seven, and the others begin wandering down stairs after he arrives. Joe and Eddie are the last to come, just after 7:30. For a while they all just eat in quiet, until Dr. Wells speaks up, "This was a lovely breakfast, thank you Ms. Allen."

"You're welcome," says Beatrix, taking her mug of coffee into her hands and relaxing back in her seat. "So," she says. "Everyone here knows what I can do. And that there are others like me, and Tony and Clyde Mardon."

"Wait," says Iris. "I missed that part: what can Tony do?"

"He turns to metal," sys Eddie.

"Oh," says Iris, her eyes going wide.

There's another moment of silence before Joe speaks up, "I think I owe you an apology, Barry. For all those years, I called you crazy for chasing the impossible. But you really DID see something the night your mother died. And your dad... he really is innocent.”

"Yes, he is," says Beatrix. She tries to keep the frown off her face, as she's not quite sure how to feel. On the one hand it puts her at ease to be believed. On the other, it took seeing her get super powers for Joe to believe her.

"Wait," says Caitlin, “now we've missed something."

Beatrix sighs. "When I was eleven, my mother was murdered," she says with something of a practiced ease. She pauses for a moment as Chica, Caitlin, and Dr. Wells go still and wide eyed at her admission. "But everyone believed it was my father who did it. He was found holding the knife in her chest, his hands covered in blood. But I saw... I saw a man in yellow, in a sort of circle of lightning around my mother. He picked up a knife and before I could see much else,my father told me to run, and then I was ten blocks away from my house, When I got back, my mom was gone and they had arrested my dad."Now, if I can develop powers in super speed under the right circumstances--"

"There might have been someone fourteen years ago who could to," says Chica, with a slight gasp.

Dr. Wells nods along. "It does present an interesting conundrum. But, if I may pose another query: do you indeed to go on as you've begun?"

"Yes," says Beatrix with a nod. "I do."

"Wait," says Joe. "Having superpowers is one thing, but using them to fight crime is another. It's illegal for one thing, and I'm sure it'll get you killed for another."

Beatrix looks Joe in the eye. "There _will_ be more people like Clyde Mardon, Joe. And we will have no idea what they are capable of until we meet them head on. Now I have super healing to go with that super speed -- and I may not be the smartest person in this room, or the most experienced. But I'm probably the most equipped to take on other metahumans who choose to use their powers poorly.

“But aside from that, I think it also puts me into an important position to advocate for people with metahuman abilities. Because not all of them _are_ going to use their powers poorly. And--”

A knock against the front door cut Beatrix off. She might have continued, except the front door was open, with only the screen door covering it, and she could hear a child say, "Daddy, can I get down?"

She got out of her seat with Tony following her and found Oliver standing at the front door, with his son and dog by his side. "Hi," he says with his bright "I'm Oliver Queen and I'm oh so charming" smile. "Sorry for dropping in, but we wanted to make sure you were okay. Felicity would have come too, but she couldn't get the time off of work."

"Oliver Jonas," says Beatrix, for she can't help herself. "Tell me you didn't drag your son and dog on a train late last night."

"I did not drag my son and dog on a train late last night," says Oliver, with a shrug. "But we did get on a nonstop flight this morning."

Beatrix rolls her eyes and opens the screen door for them.

"Where's the potty?" the little boy asks.

"I'll show you little guy," says Tony offering out his hand to him.

"My name's Connor," he says, taking Tony's hand. He turns back to Oliver for a second, who nods at him. Connor then looks back up at Tony and, with his own quite charming smile, says, "What's your name?"

"My name's Tony." Tony can't help but smile back at the little boy as he walks him down the hall to the first floor bathroom.

Everyone is working their way out of the dining room and into the living room now, and Chica has made a beeline for the dog.

"Cedar," says Oliver to the dog, followed by a command in Russian. Cedar the dog sits prettily, and allows Chica to come up to her.

Chica offers out a fist to sniff, while asking, "Does she do alright with cats?"

"As long as they do alright with dogs," says Oliver, with a smile as everyone, save Joe and Dr. Wells, come to introduce themselves. Not least of all, Papaya comes over from where she had been perched on a cat tree, and she and Cedar begin to sniff one another.

Connor returns from the bathroom in short order and cries with delight, "Kitty!"

"Nicely, Connor," Oliver reminds his son, making everyone smile.

Connor nods happily and offers Papaya his hand to smell. Papaya, who has decided that she like Cedar, rubs up against Connor, who must be covered in Cedar's scent and therefore trustworthy as well.

"I'm confused," says Joe with a slight frown, despite the fact that he loves both small children and well behaved dogs. "How do you know Beatrix?"

"We met last year," says Oliver, his charming smile still in place. "When she helped investigate a theft at my family's company."

"And how," says Dr. Wells, who looks as if he is not particularly fond of small children or dogs, even well behaved ones, "did you know that Miss Allen had recovered from her coma, given that it has been two days now since she awoke?"

"She texted me, of course," says Oliver, batting only a single eyelash. Then ignoring Dr. Wells, he turns to Beatrix and asks, "Could I trouble you all for some water for me and juice for Connor?"

Connor catches onto his father's thought and says, "I am hungry please."

Beatrix giggles at how adorable the little boy is. She imagines Ollie was much the same when he was young. "Well, we still have some breakfast. Why don't I help fix Connor a plate, and Oliver, you can release Cedar to do any business she needs to in the backyard."

"That sounds like a plan," says Oliver, taking up Cedar's leash. "Is the cat allowed outside?"

Chica snags Papaya as she attempts to follow after Cedar. "No," says Chica, glaring at her cat. "No she is not, and you know that."

Papaya only purrs.

Oliver releases Cedar into the back yard, and then comes back to fix his own plate in the kitchen. Everyone reconvenes around the dining room table, sipping coffee, eating their last bits of eggs or biscuits and gravy. They all try to resume normal conversation, but it's difficult. Eddie, Iris, Joe and Wells know there is something fishy going on with Oliver, but can't say what. Tony, Chica, and Caitlin all strongly appear to believe that Oliver is the Arrow, given Oliver's appearance right after she ran across the country to see the Arrow.Tony brings out an extra chair for Oliver and Connor to share. Oliver holds his son in his lap, making sure Connor is fed before indulging himself in some biscuits and gravy.

"So I've met Chica and Caitlin," says Oliver when he swallows his food. "But not everyone else."

They go around introducing each other and how they all know Beatrix. Pretty soon, everyone was introduced, but Beatrix could also see the fatigue begin to wear Joe and Eddie down. Dr. Wells begged off after a bit, clearly not one for socializing if there was to be no talk of super heroes. Beatrix wasn't sure she minded. Joe also had to go, for he was too tired.

"Do you need me to take you home, Dad?" Iris asks.

"No, but thank you, baby," says Joe, waving her off. "But it'd be nice if we could have dinner as a family tonight?"

Family didn't include Eddie or probably even Tony. But still, Beatrix nods. She goes and hugs Joe, just after Iris does, and they both walk him to the door and out to the driveway. As he opens his car door, Joe turns to to them both and says, "How do you know Oliver Queen?" he asks.

"He's a friend," says Beatrix, smiling at the thought. "Anything else isn't for me to say."

Joe nods, frown in place. He pauses for a moment before he says, "I don't like this. Because I know you're both going to get mixed up in all of this, and I'm afraid of what it will mean for you."

Iris frowns at him. "Dad," she says. "We both love you, but we can't stop living our lives just because you're afraid."

"It won't stop me wanting you two to be safe," says Joe. He frowns, and holds up his hands for them to let him continue. I know you two are adults -- and you're going to make your own choices. But I'm your father. I'm never going to stop worrying about you two. You're my kids. I'll always want what's best for you." He holds out his arms to them. Beatrix and Iris both step closer to him, embracing in tandem. "I love you, girls."

"We love you, too, Dad," says Iris.

"Yes we do," Beatrix agrees.

Joe pulls back looking calm as he can, if not happy. "I'll see you tonight," he says as he climbs into the car.

They watch him go, standing side by side, but not quite touching.

Iris sighs, "I really need to tell him about Eddie."

Beatrix says nothing and tries to keep her face blank as she nods along.

Iris rolls her eyes and punches Beatrix in the arm. "I know Tony told you -- the blabber mouth."

Beatrix rolls her eyes in return. "From what he's says, and what I've seen, you both haven't been subtle, exactly."

Iris blows a raspberry at her. "Hey -- what's really up with Oliver? Did you guys have an affair or something?"

Beatrix bursts out laughing. "Ah, no. But your thoughts of my seductive prowess are endearing."

Tony means her with a frown. "What's funny?" he asks as she leans over to kiss him.

"Iris thinks I'm able to seduce Oliver," she says, kissing him again.

Oliver considers her for a moment and then shrugs, "I'm not really that hard to seduce."

"And hey," says Tony, as he tucks his chin around her shoulder. "You seduced me."

"I made you dinner."

"Same difference."

A small gasp draws their attention to where Connor had settled on the floor with a book. Onyx had finally come downstairs to investigate and was not settling herself into Connor's lap by rubbing all over him. "Daddy! I caught a cat!" he says his eyes lit up with delight.

Oliver grins at his son's excitement. "Make sure to let her go when she's done, alright?"

"Can we stay here?" Connor asks as he runs his hands through Onyx's furry. "I like cats."

"We do have a guest room," says Chica, with a shrug. "But dude, totally unrelated to if you can stay or not, but I gotta know -- did Beatrix go to see you last night?"

The smile drops off of Oliver's face for a moment before he says, "Please don't call me dude."

"Oh," says Chica nodding emphatically. "Yes, I won't. Sorry."

Oliver nods to her in return. "And yes, she did come to see me."

"For those of us that missed something," says Eddie with his arm around Iris. "Can we as why?"

Oliver looks toward Beatrix who does her best to look sheepish. Doubtless, she thinks, he knows that Chica, Caitlin and Tony know that she went to see the Arrow last night. And it is a little suspicious that Oliver Queen shows up the next day. "Because," says Oliver after a moment of consideration. "I'm the Arrow," he says as easily as he says his own name.

Everyone but Beatrix and Connor stares at Oliver, their eyes wide open and their mouths slightly parted.

"Daddy," says Connor. "Can we get a cat? I'll share with JJ."

"We have to as Uncle Slade," says Oliver with a shrug. "He holds veto power on all animal adoptions."

Connor nods very seriously in return.

Caitlin just shakes her head in defeat at everything and goes for the kitchen. "I have not had enough coffee to process all of this, this morning."

Everyone follows after, but Tony grips her hand tightly as they go.

Beatrix has a feeling that things have begun -- not so much changed but have made more of what the world will be. She's not quite sure what it all means just yet. But she's willing to run along for the ride and find out.

 

Eventually, they all go their separate ways. Tony, Eddie, and Oliver all need sleep. Iris, Chica, and Caitlin all need to head to work. Connor falls asleep on top of his father though Beatrix has a feeling he won't be out for long, so she sticks around the house, rather than going out. When Oliver wakes up a few hours later, he all but orders her out of her own house/

"What the hel-ck, Oliver," says Beatrix casting a side eye to where Oliver had deposited a still sleeping Connor on the couch.

"If you have something you need to do -- go do it," he says simply, fiddling with the coffee machine. "Not that I don't appreciate the offer to babysit but you're making me nervous, so you should go do what you need to do."

Beatrix sighs. "When Tony and Eddie wake up, tell them that I went to Iron Heights."

That does give Oliver pause, and he looks up at her. "The prison?"

Beatrix nods. "Yeah. I'm gonna go see my dad."

Oliver nods, recognition dawning on his face, and Beatrix runs from the house. She could have called a cab, or taken the truck, but there was a restlessness in her bones she needed to outrun. She stops just far enough away from the prison transport to make it look like someone dropped her off, and to make sure no one saw her approach, and walks up the rest of the way.

After all the doors and body checks it takes to get into the visitation room, Beatrix watches her father enter on the other side of the glass. He looks up at her and then slowly smiles, tears forming in his eyes. It occurs to her that no one has told him yet, that she was awake. The both sit down across from one another and pick up their phones.

"Hey, Slugger," he says.

Beatrix laughs, feeling tears of her own coming on. "You know, you've been calling me that since I was eleven years old. But you know what? I actually got into a fight yesterday."

Henry gasps. "You just got out of a coma. I'm not sure you should be walking, let alone getting into a fight."

Beatrix ducks her head in admonishment. "Yeah, you're probably right."

After a moment, Henry says, "Hey," causing her to look back up again. He grins at her. "Did'ja win?"

"Yeah," says Beatrix, with a nod. It gives her pause for a second, thinking about Clyde. "Only, I don't think I won because I was stronger or ... better equipped or anything like that. I think I won because I showed him mercy."

"That's good," says Henry with a bright smile. "Mercy is a rare quality in a person anymore. You should remember that, Beatrix. And hey, how's Tony?"

"He's good," says Beatrix with nod. "He's really good, actually. He was excited to see me."

Henry scoffs and rubs his eyes. "Sweetheart, as happy as I am that you two might be making me grandchildren -- especially since Tony says you're gonna name one after me -- I really don't need to know about that."

"Sorry," says Beatrix, even though she giggles. She sobers after a moment and says, "You know, Dad, I -- I never believed that you killed Mom, right?"

Henry sobers too, but nods with a smile that does not fill his face. "You believing in me is all I need to keep me going."

"I know Mom still loves you," says Beatrix, thinking of the spirit who had spoken with her mother's face. "And I want you to know I haven't given up on getting you out of here."

"Beatrix," says Henry. He almost sounds a little like Joe -- that's the one thing they've had in common over the years, is how they've tired a little of Beatrix's endless quest. "Sweetheart. I don't want you to give up your life trying to save mine. I want you to be able to get married to Tony -- or anyone else you want to -- have little Henry and little Aurora -- live your life."

The tears finally start going down Beatrix's face as she talks. She swipes at them but keeps going. "You know what's funny? Till now I didn't realize how much I've felt like I've been standing still since Mom's death. But now, I finally feel like I can start to do just that, to live."

"Good," says Henry. "Because you deserve that, you know? To live."

"I know," says Beatrix. Because she does now. She realizes just how unfair she had thought the whole thing before. That she and her father had witnessed the same event, only for him to be locked away and for her to live free. But she knew, now, that she deserved a life, even if she hadn't given up the thought that he deserved one too.

"And uh," Henry coughs a little falsely, "No rush on the grand kids. But I would like to see them some time soon."

Beatrix bursts out laughing, unable to control herself. "Okay, I'll keep that in mind." With a smile she places her hand on the glass.

Henry smiles back, matching his print for her own.

Beatrix vowed that when he did meet his grandchildren, it wouldn't be from behind the glass. He'd get to hold them, and he'd get to hold her again too. "I love you, Dad."

"I love you, too, Slugger." Henry smiles at her. "And hey, now I get to catch you up on events for a change."

Beatrix laughs and lets her father talk. They talk until they're forced to stop, their allotted time together over.

There's all sorts of things in her future, Beatrix knows. But, she thinks, Oliver is right. She will become a hero, one that people deserve, one that people need. She may not save the world, but she can help. One person at a time, helping them out, in a Flash.

\-- End --


End file.
